1S91I Mackay oil the Golden Plover. IC) 



the stomachs of 11 good many which I have shot on Nantucket, 

 and have never found any grassho})peis in them, nor in fact any- 

 tliing hut crickets (which seem their principal food there), 

 grass seeds, a little vegetable matter, like seaweed, coarse sand, 

 and small stones. I have also frequently shot them with the 

 vent stained purple, probably from the berries of the Empctnim 

 itigriim. I have rarely seen a poor or lean bird that landed 

 while making the southern migration. While they are not all 

 in the same condition, they are, as a rule, quite fat. The eye 

 is dark hazel, very lustrous, and appealing, and is their most 

 beautiful feature to my mind. Those birds killed soon after land- 

 ing have the bottoms of their feet quite black ; after living on the 

 Island awhile, they turn whitish. I have no reason to offer for 

 this change. 



Their local names along the coast are numerous, and among 

 them are Greenback, Palebelly, Palebreast, Greenhead, Bullhead, 

 Toadhead, Frostbird, Blackbreast, and Threetoes. 

 r VVhen scattered over considerable ground, as is usual after they 

 have been any length of time on their feeding ground, every bird ap- 

 parently on its own hook, if alarmed, a note is sounded ; they then 

 rise so as to meet as soon as possible at a common centre, which 

 gained, away they go in a compact body. When high up in the 

 air, flying on their migration, I have often noticed the flocks as- 

 sume shapes that reminded me of the flight of Geese ; they also 

 fly in the form of a cluster, with one or more single lines out 

 behind ; also broadside in long straight lines, with an apparent 

 velocity of about one and a half miles a minute, measured by the 

 eye as they pass along the headlantls. When flying near the 

 ground they course over it at a high rate of speed, in every variety 

 of form, the shape of the flock constantly changing, and frequently 

 following every undulation of the surface, stopping suddenly and 

 alighting when a favorable spot is noticed. They are extremely 

 gregarious, and I have had the same flock return to my decoys as 

 many as four times, after some of their Slumber had been shot 

 each time. Whei) approaching the decoys every bird seems to be 

 whistling, or, as I have often expressed it, uttering a note like 

 coodle. coodle., coodle. During the middle of the day they are 

 fond of seeking the margins of ponds, where they sit quietly for 

 a long time, if undisturbed. When disturbed they are almost 

 certain to return, in a short time, to the same spot from which they 



