"lui.t ' I '" '" ral '. 581 



Virginia, came under my notice on July 20, L913. The writer has been 

 a Btudenl of th<- bird life of this county for the past twenty years, yet 



is the lir-l time in his experience that, he has been able to positively 



identify this game bird in this locality. 



While sitting on the porch of our residence at Park View in company with 

 his wife the writer WM attracted by the peculiar fluttering of a bird which 

 alighted upon the lawn about thirty feet distant. This characteristic 



and familiar flight recalled instantly to mind this bird which he had 

 formerly often seen in the swampy land about Ithaca, N. Y., but, never 

 before here. The bird had hardly alighted before its long bill and large 

 black eyes proclaimed it Philohela minor, but an exclamation of surprise 

 from one of us caused it to fly again about ten feet farther away. The 

 writer then followed the stranger behind the shrubbery until it flew into 

 the garden in the rear of the house, where we both under cover of a friendly 

 bush from a distance of only ten feet, calmly watched the owner of those 

 large eyes bore in the damp ground of the potato patch for worms. The 

 protective coloration did not hide; it from view at such close range as it was 

 but 8 o'clcok in the evening and quite light. After watching the visitor 

 for ten minutes we left him peacefully to pursue his way. — Robert B. 

 McLain, Wheeling, W. Va. 



Eskimo Curlew {Numenius borealis) in Massachusetts. — On Sep- 

 tember 5, 1913, an Eskimo Curlew was taken on the marsh at East Orleans, 

 Mass., by Mr. John Greenough Rogers. 



The bird was alone and when taken the weather was thick and raining 

 with an east wind, and since the afternoon of the day before the wind had 

 been northeast to east with rain most of the time. 



After the bird was shot, what appeared like hardened whitish grease 

 formed at the nostrils. The centre feathers of the under tail-coverts and 

 the under sides of the ends of the tail feathers were stained a purple color. 

 There was nothing in the stomach but the bird was very fat. 



The specimen was preserved and is now in my collection. — Charles R. 

 Lamb, Cambridge, Mass. 



The Golden Plover {Charadriui dominicus dominicus) in Michigan 

 in Spring — In " Michigan Bird Life," 1912,210, Prof. Barrows mentions 

 that " although several observers have reported it as seen in spring I have 

 not been able to find a spring specimen in any collection in the state, and 

 it seems likely that these reports may be incorrect." There is a skin in the 

 Museum of Zoology, University of Michigan, that was secured on April 20, 

 1890, by Mr. Norman A. Wood near Pittsfield, one mile north of Saline, 

 Washenau Count}'. There were a flock of some thirty birds feeding in a 

 wet meadow and five were secured from this flock. Two specimens were 

 mounted for some Chicago man, name now forgotten; these were nearly all 

 black on the underparts. The specimen in the Museum collection is in a 

 very advanced plumage. — B. H. Swales, Mus. of Zoology, Univ. of Michi- 

 gan, Ann Arbor, Mich. 



