RED-BREASTED SANDPIPER. 141 



alarmed, neither do they run about in the water as much as 

 some others, or with the same rapidity, but appear more tran- 

 quil and deliberate. In the month of November they retire to 

 the south. 



This species is ten inches long, and twenty in extent; the bill 

 is black, and about an inch and a half long; the chin, eyebrows, 

 and whole breast, a pale brownish orange colour; crown, hind- 

 head, from the upper mandible backwards, and neck, dull white, 

 streaked with black; back a pale slaty olive, the feathers tipt 

 with white, barred and spotted with black and pale ferruginous; 

 tail-coverts white, elegantly barred with black; wings plain 

 dusky, black towards the extremity; the greater coverts tipt 

 with white ; shafts of the primaries white; tail pale ashy olive, 

 finely edged with white, the two middle feathers somewhat the 

 longest; belly and vent white, the latter marked with small ar- 

 row-heads of black; legs and feet black; toes bordered with a 

 narrow membrane; eye small and black. 



In some specimens, both of males and females, the red on 

 the breast was much paler, in others it descended as far as the 

 thighs. Both sexes seemed nearly alike. 



