THE SHORE BIRDS. 201 



ing the past thirty years the Rapacious Birds of Great Britain have 

 undergone an amount of persecution so determined and systematic 

 that many of the species have altogether disappeared ; and as by the 

 latest records of the meetings of the British Association assembled 

 at Norwich, it would appear that even sea-fowl are now in danger 

 of extirpation [they are now protected], owing to the extraordinary 

 demand for their plumes and feathers for marketable purposes, it may 

 not be out of place for the ornithologists of this great continent to 

 consider the propriety of protecting, even now, some of the species 

 thus proclaiming by their scarcity that the time may not be far dis- 

 tant when we, too, may have to lament their loss." 



The Phalaropes, or " Coot-footed Snipe," as I have 

 heard them called, are represented by three species, 

 all occasionally seen, but nowhere abundant, except 

 on the sea-coast at intervals. These curious birds 

 look like sand-pipers, but do not act like them. They 

 are swimmers rather than waders, and when seen at 

 a little distance are remarkably duck-like. They 

 are all migratory, and in the Middle States and 

 New England are seen in spring and autumn, gen- 

 erally at the latter season. They appear on our 

 inland waters as well as along the coast, and doubt- 

 less many a specimen is shot and goes the way of all 

 game-birds, the naturalists of the neighborhood not 

 suspecting that such a bird was about. I have twice 

 seen examples of two of the species on the counter 

 of a game dealer in Philadelphia, and I have seen the 

 Red Phalarope several times on the Delaware River, 

 more than one hundred miles from the ocean. 



The red phalarope breeds in the highest northern 

 regions, and is said to have an unusual method of 

 conducting the preliminary courtship: the female 

 captures a mate, and after the eggs are laid lets him 



