316 THE PLOVERS 



the head is white, the white area extending upwards and backwards to encircle 

 the neck : below the white throat is a broad band of black, which similarly extends 

 upwards and backwards to encircle the neck behind the white collar just described. 

 The mantle and wing-coverts are, like the crown, of a pale grey-brown, but the major 

 coverts are tipped with white. The lower back and upper tail-coverts are coloured 

 like the mantle ; the median tail feathers are of a similar hue at the base, but 

 darken into a deep brownish black towards the tip ; the three succeeding feathers 

 are similarly coloured but have white tips, the next pair have the outer web wholly 

 white, while the outermost are entirely white. In addition to the white on the 

 shafts of the primaries already referred to, the innermost primaries have an oblong 

 patch of white along the middle of the outer web, forming a white bar in the ex- 

 tended web. The secondaries have white bases, the white gradually extending 

 downwards from without inwards, so that the innermost feathers are wholly white. 

 The breast, flanks, abdomen, and under tail-coverts are white. The beak is orange- 

 yellow at the base, the rest black, and the legs are orange-yellow. The iris is dark 

 brown. The female has the black collar somewhat smaller. The juvenile plumage 

 differs from that of the adult in lacking the black band across the forehead ; while 

 the band below the eye and the collar round the neck are of a dusky brown instead 

 of black. The young in down have the upper parts white relieved by a narrow 

 line of buffish grey on the crown, and a semicircular line running round the occiput ; 

 on either side of the median line are fine mottlings of grey. The back is mottled 

 grey, and the under parts are pure white, [w. p. p.] 



2. Distribution. In the British Isles this species is resident, or only subject 

 to local movements, on almost every part of our coasts where there is any sand 

 or shingle. It also breeds at considerable distances inland at a few places : the 

 waste lands near Thetford have long been known to be inhabited by this species, 

 and recently it has been found nesting on a sewage farm near Enfield, Middlesex, 

 by R. B. Lodge, and also in Worcestershire, as well as locally in Scotland. 

 Outside the British Isles it nests in Iceland, the Faeroes, sparingly on 

 Spitsbergen and Bear Island, on Novaya Zemlya, Waigatz, and Kolguev. On 

 the Continent it is found along the coasts of the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, 

 as well as in the Baltic, and in some localities breeds inland, as in the fells 

 of Lapland, by the great rivers of Russia south to about lat. 48-50, in 

 Hungary, and on the shingle-beds in the Rhone valley. Its southward limits 

 extend to Portugal, occasionally to S. Spain, and a few pairs are said to remain 

 to breed in Italy and Sicily. In Asia it ranges east at least to the Kolyma valley 



