LIMICOL&. ( 252 ) SCOLOPACID^E. 



THE GREEN SANDPIPER. 



Totanus ochropus. 



birds of passage piping up and down, 



TENNYSON. 



ONE morning about the middle of September 1877 the 

 gamekeeper at Paxton House, while walking with his gun 

 in the Wester Grass Park, near my house, heard a shrill 

 whistle over his head, and, looking up, saw two birds like 

 Snipes flying rapidly towards the Tweed at a considerable 

 height in the air. He fired at them, when one fell, which 

 he brought to me, and I found it to be a beautiful specimen 

 of the Green Sandpiper. Mr. Hardy records a male shot 

 near Chirnside on the 1st of May 1876 j 1 and, writing 

 under date the 22nd of August 1877, says: "After a 

 continuation of wet weather several temporary pools were 

 formed in the dean at Oldcambus, which were frequented 

 by Wild Ducks ; and the restless Eedshanks, leaving the 

 sea-side, circled round the margins. To one of the loneliest 

 also a Green Sandpiper resorted for a few days. It appears 

 to delight in quiet tarns and remote watercourses, where it 

 can pick up worms undisturbed. This is the character of 

 the situations in which hitherto I have surprised this occa- 

 sional autumnal visitant." 2 It was observed at Oldcambus 

 on the 17th of July 1879. 3 Mr. George Bolam, in a letter 

 to me dated the 25th of August 1884, writes: " It may 

 interest you to know that yesterday Mr. Evan Sanderson 



i Hist. Ber. Nat. Club, vol. viii. p. 196. 2 Ibid. vol. viii. pp. 528, 529. 



3 Ibid. vol. ix. p. 401. 



