SANDERLIMG. 429 



the food for wliicli they are searching, they very soon take to 

 their M'iiigs and remove to another, now and then in so hnr- 

 ried a manner, that one might sui)pose they had been sud- 

 denly frightened. The contents of the stomach of those 

 which I shot while thus occupied, were slender sea-worms, 

 about an inch in length, together with minute shell-fish and 

 gravel. At other times, when they were seen following the 

 receding waves, and wading up to the belly in the returning 

 waters, I found in them small shrimps, and other Crustacea," 

 The Sanderling has been observed early in June on the 

 west coast of Scotland by Mr. Symmonds, and by JNIr. 

 Bullock at the northern extremity of Scotland, as late as the 

 end of June, but was believed to go still farther north to 

 breed. M. Nilsson says it visits the shores of Sweden, and 

 breeds farther north. Faber states that it appears in Iceland, 

 but leaves and goes forther north to breed on the coasts of 

 Greenland and Labrador. Major Sabine, in the Appendix 

 to Sir Edward Parry's First Arctic Voyage, says, " The 

 Sanderling breeds in considerable numbers on the North 

 Georgian Islands ; several pairs w^ere killed at different 

 periods of the breeding-season, the males and females of 

 which were invariably found to d'liTcr in their plumage ; the 

 general colour of the female being lighter, and having more 

 cinereous and less of black and reddish marking than that of 

 the male : this is especially the case on the chin, throat, and 

 fore part of the neck ; which may be described in the female 

 as white, with a very slight sprinkling of dark spots, and 

 scarcely any appearance of red ; whereas in the males, the 

 dark colours greatly predominate." Dr. Richardson says this 

 bird breeds on the coast of Hudson's Bay as low as the fifty- 

 fifth parallel. Mr. Hutchins informs us that it makes its 

 nest in the marshes, rudely of grass, and lays four dusky- 

 coloured eggs, spotted with black ; incubation commencing in 

 the middle of June. The Sanderling is very well known to 



