MONTAUK POINT. 185 
and on the following day, hail a sky as cloudless as 
the most ardent sportsman could desire. But alas! 
the flight has gone by, scared away perhaps by the 
storm, or retreating before the advancing fall; and 
when we take our seat at the breakfast-table, we 
are obliged to admit that only nine birds have fallen 
to our gun. 
But the irrepressible and inextinguishable Lester 
rises triumphant in this emer gency. He boldly sug- 
gests that there must be some sluggards, who ean 
tarried, spell-bound by the attractions of such a ter- 
restrial, or, rather ornithological, paradise; and 
accordingly, he} hitches . a venerable specimen of 
the genus “ agus, ” and'we start for an excursion 
*‘ over the hills a far away.” Before we have ad- 
vanced a couple miles W we have bagged a half 
dozen solitary specimens of Bar tram’s Sandpiper or 
Grey Plover, so dear to tthe sportsman and the 
gourmand, but! have seen nO trace of the object of 
our pursuit. When, sudd as we surmount one 
of the sw elling eniinences which are the prevailing 
feature of this § dis ict of country, we come upon a 
sight such as, perhaps, but few sportsmen have ever 
beheld. A gentle hollow, xspr eads before us, for 
several acres, literally coyered with the ranks of the 
much -desiredghe matchless Golden Plover. 
As they stand in serriéd legions, the white mark 
on their heads gives a strange chequered weirdness 
to the phalanx: and we involuntarily pause, spell- 
bound by the novelty of the spectacle. Lester him- 
self, though an old hand, owns that he has never 
