LOBIPES HYPERBOREUS : NORTHERN PHALAROPE. l8/ 



a friend (Am. Jour. Sci., xliv, 1843, p. 268). Merriam 

 copies this statement as his only Connecticut authority 

 (Rev. B. Conn., 1877, p. 103). All the following records 

 appear to flow from Audubon, and to be without later 

 confirmation : Putnam, Pr. Essex Inst, i, 1856, p. 217 ; 

 Allen, Pr. Essex Inst., iv, 1864, p. 86 ; Coues, Pr. Essex 

 Inst., v, 1868, p. 292 ; Brewer, Pr. Bost. Soc., xvii, 1875, 

 p. 445 ; Allen, Bull. Essex Inst., x, 1878, p. 23. We have, 

 however, an authentic Rhode Island instance (Newport, 

 Aug. 2, 1880; Jencks, Bull. Nutt. Club, v, 1880, p. 237). 



NORTHERN PHALAROPE. 

 LOBIPES HYPERBOREUS (L.) Cuv. 



Chars. Bill generally as in Steganopus, but shorter, basally 

 stouter, and tapering to a very acute, compressed tip ; ridge of 

 culmen and gonys less depressed ; interramal space longer and 

 broader. Wings long. Tail short, greatly rounded. Legs and 

 feet, short ; tibiae denuded for but a brief space ; tarsus not 

 longer than the middle toe. Toes very broadly margined with a 

 membrane which is scolloped or indented at each phalangeal 

 joint, and united basally as far as the second joint between the 

 outer and middle toe, and as far as the first joint between the 

 inner and middle toe. The feet are thus semipalmated. Claws 

 very small and short. Coloration something like that of Wil- 

 son's Phalarope ; but the much smaller size of the species, to- 

 gether with the generic characters here given, will suffice for 

 identification. Length, 7.00; extent, 13-5; win g 4-25; tail, 

 2.00 ; bill, i.oo ; tarsus, i.oo. 



Though we are already among the " water birds," we 

 have not yet seen any one to be fairly called an off-the- 

 coast or sea-bird proper. This Phalarope, however, is 

 such a creature, and a very curious compound it is of a 

 wader and a swimmer. Take one of our common little 

 Sandpipers, fit it for sea by making oars of its feet, and 



