BAR-TAILED GODWIT. 571 



I believe this Godwit is not found in Lapland, nor do I 

 find it included among the Birds of Iceland or of Greenland 

 in any catalogue, unless it has been confounded with the 

 Black-tailed Godwit. It is found on the shores of the Cas- 

 pian sea ; it was obtained by M. Menetries the Russian Na- 

 turalist on the scientific expedition to the Caucasus, and M. 

 Temminck says it is found in India, at Java, and Timor. 



The egg of this Godwit is figured in a Foreign work, and 

 I have in my collection, one egg, obtained in Yarmouth 

 market, which so exactly resembles the coloured figure of the 

 egg in the work referred to, that I venture to describe its 

 size, colours, and markings, but without any other authority 

 than that I have named for its beinar the effs: of the Bar- 

 tailed Godwit. This egg measures one inch eleven lines in 

 length, by one inch and four lines in breadth, of a pale yel- 

 lowish Avood brown, speckled, spotted, and blotched with 

 clove brown, and umber brown. 



The food of this species is aquatic insects, worms, and 

 molluscs. In winter these birds are seen on various parts of 

 our sea coast. At this time of the year the beak is black at 

 the point, the basal portion pale reddish brown ; irides dusky 

 brown ; top of the head, and back of the neck, ash brown, 

 each feather with a central streak of darker brown along the 

 line of the shaft ; back, and scapulars, dark brown, edged 

 with pale wood brown ; all the wing-coverts, secondaries and 

 tertials, dark brown, with greyish white edges ; primary 

 quill-feathers dusky black, with white shafts, the shorter ones 

 edged with white ; rump, and upper tail-coverts white, barred 

 with brown ; tail feathers barred throughout their whole 

 length with dark brown, and greyish white in nearly equal 

 breadth ; neck in front, ash brown ; breast, belly, and vent, 

 white ; under tail-coverts white, with only one or two trans- 

 verse bars of brown towards the end; legs, and toes, dark 

 blue, the claws black. 



