364 PIPING PLOVER. 



spotted with rufous gray ; the breast almost entirely of a jet-black 

 color, always interrupted by some insulated white feathers, and neve* 

 so broadly black as in Tringa alpina : all the remaining under parts 

 are white, with a very few dusky streaks on the sides. 



At one year of age the male is on the back of a less bright rufous 

 spotted with black : on the breast the black consists merely of a spot, 

 and is mixed with many white feathers. The female much resembles 

 the male at the same age. The very young is above of a ferruginous 

 color varied with white, yellowish, and black ; all beneath white, 

 streaked with dusky ferruginous on the throat. 



They frequent marshy shores, and the borders of lakes and brackish 

 waters. They are very social even in the breeding time, and are then 

 by no means shy : during autumn they join company even with different 

 birds, and become very wild. Their voice resembles that of Tringa 

 alpina, but is more feeble. They feed on worms, aquatic insects and 

 similar food : build near marshes and lakes, among weeds : they lay 

 four eggs, smaller and much less in diameter than those of Tringa 

 alpina, of a yellowish-gray spotted with olive or chestnut brown. 



CHARADRIUS MELODUS. 



PIPING PLOVER.* 



[Plate XXIV. Fig. 3.] 



Charadrius melodus, Ord, in the reprint of Wilson's Orn. vii., p. 71, and Gen. Ind. 

 of the Water Birds, Siippl. Orn. Wils. (ix.), p. ccxii. Nob. Obs. Wils. Orn. Sp. 

 220. Id. Cat. and Syn. Birds U. S. Sp. 217. Id. Speech. Comp. sp. Philad.— 

 Charadrius Okenii, Waglek, Syst. Av. i., Charad. Sp. 24. — Ringed Plover, var. 

 B. Lath. Gen. Hist. ix. p. 327, Sp. 12, var. B. 



The well merited elevation of this bird to the rank of a species fully 

 vindicates our predecessor from the unjust censure of Temminck, who 

 thought his figure of it intended for the Charadrius Jiiatioula. The 

 same censure is repeated and' aggravated by Mr. Sabine, who probably 

 thought it intended for the C. semipalmatus. But if the figure is free 

 from the supposed fault of incorrectness, its extremely diminished size, 

 which renders it almost useless, requires that the bird should now appear 

 in this work in its full dimensions. 



* See Wilson's American Ornithology, Ringed Plover, Charadrius Hiaticula, 

 Vol. II. p. 35.5, pi. 37, fig. 3, for a reduced representation of the adult in spring 

 dress, and the history. 



