PIED OYSTER-CATCHER. 378 



rienced sportsman, who nevertheless was unacquainted with this bird. 

 He informed me that two very old men to whom it was shown called 

 it a Hagdel. He adds, " it was shot from a flock which was first dis- 

 covered on the beach near the entrance of Boston harbor. On the 

 approach of the gunner they rose and instantly formed in line, like a 

 corps of troops, and advanced in perfect order, keeping well dressed. 

 They made a number of circuits in the air previous to being shot at, 

 but wheeled in line ; and the man who fired into the flock, observed 

 that all their evolutions were like a regularly organized military 

 company." 



The Oyster-catcher will not only take to the water when wounded, 

 but can also swim and dive well. This fact I can assert from my 

 own observation, the e.xploits of one of them in this way having nearly 

 cost me my life. On the sea beach of Cape May, not far from a deep 

 and rapid inlet, I broke the wing of one of these birds, and being 

 without a dog, instantly pursued it towards the inlet, which it made 

 for with great rapidity. We both plunged in nearly at the same instant ; 

 but the bird eluded my grasp, and I sunk beyond my depth ; it was 

 not until this moment that I recollected having carried in my gun 

 along with me. On rising to the surface I found the bird had 

 dived, and a strong ebb current was carrying me fast towards the 

 ocean, encumbered with a gun and all my shooting apparatus ; I was 

 compelled to relinquish my bird, and to make for the shore, with con- 

 siderable mortification, and the total destruction of the contents of 

 my powderhorn. The wounded bird afterwards rose, and swam with 

 great buoyancy out among the breakers. 



On the same day I shot and examined three individuals of this spe- 

 cies, two of which measured each eighteen inches in length, and thirty- 

 five inches in extent ; the other was somewhat less. The bills varied 

 in length, measuring three inches and three-quarters, three and a half, 

 and three and a quarter, thinly compressed at the point, very much 

 like that of the Woodpecker tribe, but remarkably narrowed near the 

 base where the nostrils are placed, probably that it may work with more 

 freedom in the sand. This instrument for two-tliirds of its length 

 towards the point, was evidently much worn by digging ; its color a 

 rich orange scarlet, somewhat yellowish near the tip ; eye large, orbits 

 of the same bright scarlet as the bill, irides brilliant yellow, pupil small, 

 bluish black ; under the eye is a small spot of white, and a large bed of 

 the same on the wing coverts ; head, neck, scapulars, rump, wing quills, 

 and tail black ; several of the primaries are marked on the outer vanes 

 with a slanting band of white ; secondaries white, part of them tipped 

 with black ; the whole lower parts of the body, sides of the rump, tail 

 coverts, and that portion of the tail which they cover, are pure wiiite ; 

 the wings, when shut, cover the whole white plumage of the back and 



