THE PLOVER TRIBE 2257 



to those of stilts, that one account will serve for both; and we may accordingly close 

 our notice with the following description of the appearance of a colony of these 

 birds on the Arkansas, observed by Dr. Coues. " The avocets," he writes "walked 

 leisurely about, up to the belly in water, with graceful, deliberate steps, each of 

 which was accompanied by a swaying of the head and neck. When approached too 

 closely, they rose lightly from the water, uttering their peculiar cries, flapped leis- 

 urely to a little distance, and again alighted to pursue their peaceful search for food, 

 forgetting, or at least not heeding, their recent alarm. As they rose from the 

 water, their singular long legs were allowed to dangle for a few moments, but were 

 afterward stretched stiffly backward, as a counterpoise to their long necks; and, 

 thus balanced, their light bodies were supported with the greatest ease by their 

 ample wings. When about to realight, they sailed without flapping for a little dis- 

 tance, just clearing the water, their legs again hanging loosely; as they touched the 

 ground, their long wings were held almost upright for an instant, then deliberately 

 folded, and settled in place with a few slight motions." 



Much more stoutly built, and with shorter and thicker neck and legs 

 ~ r t h than the stilts, the oyster catchers, or sea pies, may be diagnosed by 

 the metatarsus being inferior in length to the nearly straight and 

 rather thick beak. The long and pointed wings extend, when closed, to about the 

 extremity of the squared tail; the beak is somewhat compressed and truncate at the 

 tip, with considerable specific variation in outline; but a small portion of the tibia 

 is bare; the reticulated metatarsus is short and stout; and the first toe is wanting. 

 The common oyster catcher (Hcematopus ostralegus) , which is a resident in the Brit- 

 ish Isles, is the typical representative of the genus, and while four other species 

 resemble it in their pied plumage, the remaining two are black. The distribution 

 of the genus is almost world-wide. Agreeing with all the other Old-World forms, 

 in its dull crimson-red legs, the European species is specially characterized by the 

 lower part of the back, rump, and upper tail coverts being white, and by the white 

 pattern on the primaries being well marked on the outer webs of the fourth and 

 fifth quills of that series. In this species the beak and region round the eye are 

 orange; all the upper parts are black, with the exception of the lower back, rump, 

 and upper tail coverts, the basal portion of the tail feathers, and a band across the 

 wing comprising the greater wing coverts and some of the secondaries, which are 

 white; the primaries being also more or less marked with the latter color. With 

 the exception of the chin, throat, breast, and a few of the wing coverts, all the 

 tinder parts are white. In length this bird varies from sixteen to seventeen inches. 

 Migratory in many districts, this species inhabits the whole of Europe, and a con- 

 siderable portion of the eastern half of Asia, as well as North Africa, ranging to the 

 Arctic Circle, and visiting Western India in winter. In Japan, Northern China, 

 Amurland, etc., it is replaced by the Japanese oyster catcher H. osculans), distin- 

 guished by its long beak, and the white on the primaries not appearing till the 

 sixth quill while in the New World its place is taken by the American oyster 

 catcher (H. palleatus], in which (as in all the New- World species) the legs are pale 

 flesh color, while the upper parts below the black neck are, with the exception of 

 the greater wing coverts and tail coverts, brown instead of black. The black spe- 

 142 



