MO BRITISH BIRDS, WITH THEIR NESTS AND EGGS. 



plate ; it agrees exactly with the appearance of an egg which was laid by a Knot 

 in the aviaries at Lilford, and which is now in Cambridge. For this last infor- 

 mation I am indebted to Mr. Dresser ; the plate represents the Knot's egg as 

 resembling that of a Turnstone, of a grey-brown (not greenish) ground colour, 

 blotched with brown-black. Col. Feilden shot the male bird, in attendance upon 

 the young, in Grinnell Land. 



With us, the Knot is a bird of flat, sandy or, preferably, of muddy shores, 

 and is always worth shooting for the table. Sir R. Payne-Gallwey once killed 

 one hundred and sixty at a single discharge of his young cannon, but I have 

 never got more than a dozen with an ordinary twelve-bore. The young birds are 

 tolerably guileless when they first arrive in August, but soon get taught caution. 

 The best time to get at them is when they are just being turned off the shore 

 by a high tide. The food consists of small mollusca, but nothing living of the 

 right size seems to come amiss. Formerly they were caught with nets, and 

 fattened (upon bread and milk) for the table in considerable numbers. Sir Thos. 

 Browne speaks of a light being always kept in the room where they were fattened, 

 in order to induce them to feed night and day, as in their breeding quarters in the 

 land of the midnight sun. They are often called " Plover- Knot " by shore-shooters, 

 sometimes " Plovers " only. They are one of the first birds to be aware that the 

 tide has begun to ebb, but they do not settle at once upon the shore, but wheel 

 about in flocks, often at a height inconveniently great (for us), until the tide has 

 gone down far enough to suit them. I do not recollect hearing the Knot utter 

 auy kind of a note.* 



* The Knot is a very noisy bird when feeding with its fellows, constantly reiterating a chuckling cry. 

 The alarm-note uttered by the Knot when disturbed is a lively twitter, Twih and Tui-twih. It has also a loud 

 croaking call-note, probably peculiar to the summer months. H.A.M. 



