159 



PEEWIT. 



PE-WIT. TE-WIT. LAPWING. COMMON LAPWING. CRESTED LAPWING. 

 GREEN LAPWING. GREEN PLOVER. LAPWING SANDPIPER. FRENCH PIGEON. 



PLATE CLV. FIG. II. 



Vanellus cristatus, FLEMING. SELBT. 



Trintja vanellus, PEXNANT. MONTAGU. 



THE nest is that which 'Mother Earth* supplies by a small and slight 

 depression in the soil, with the addition sometimes of a few bits of 

 grass, heath, or rushes, and this perhaps answering to the geographical 

 description of an island, 'entirely surrounded by water/ on the marshy 

 ground. To avoid, however, the evils attendant on this contingency, 

 a mole-hill or other slight eminence is often chosen for a cradle. The 

 young are not capable of flying till nearly full-grown. 



The eggs, which are, like those of most if not of all small birds, 

 very delicate eating, and sold in immense numbers for the purpose, 

 are four in number; and so disposed in their narrow bed, as to take 

 up the smallest amount of room, the narrow ends pointed inwards, 

 like the radii of a circle, to 'one common centre/ They vary to an 

 extraordinary degree, though generally very much alike; some are blotted 

 nearly all over with deep shades of brown. In general they are of a 

 deep green colour, blotted and irregularly marked with brownish black. 

 They are wide at one end and taper at the other, as is the case with 

 the birds of this class. They are hatched in fifteen or sixteen days. 



One variety is of a light yellowish olive ground colour, spotted and 

 marked over with dark brown and grey. 



A second is dark green, smeared over in some parts with a light 

 greenish brown, and spotted over with very dark brownish black spots, 

 and several large marks of the same. 



