140 BIRDS OF ONTARIO. 



Those who have seen this species only in Ontario can have but 

 little idea of its appearance during the breeding season, as seen by 

 Mr. Nelson in Alaska, and I regret that his description is too long 

 to be copied in full. He was under his tent on a lonely island near 

 the mouth of the Yukon. He says : " My eyelids began to droop and 

 the scene to become indistinct, when suddenly a low, hollow, booming 

 note struck my ear, and sent my thoughts back to a spring morning 

 in Northern Illinois, and to the loud, vibrating tones of the prairie 

 chickens. A few seconds passed and again arose the note; a moment 

 later and, gun in hand, I stood outside the tent. Once again the 

 note was repeated close by, and a glance revealed its author. Stand- 

 ing in the thin grass, ten or fifteen yards from me, with its throat 

 inflated until it was as large as the rest of the bird, was a male 

 Pectoral Sandpiper. 



" The succeeding days afforded opportunity to observe the bird as 

 it uttered its singular notes, under a variety of situations, and at 

 various hours of the day or during the light Arctic night. Before the 

 bird utters these notes, it fills its oesophagus with air to such an 

 extent that the breast and throat is inflated to more than twice its 

 natural size, and the great air sac thus formed gives the peculiar 

 resonant quality to the note. Whenever the Pectoral pursues his 

 love-making, his rather low but pervading note swells and dies in 

 musical cadences, which form a striking part of the great bird chorus 

 heard at this season in the north." 



TRTNGA FUSCICOLLIS VIEILL. 

 99. White-rumped Sandpiper. (240) 



Size, medium; upper tail coverts, white; feet, black; bill, black, light- 

 colored at base below ; coloration otherwise much as in Baird's Sandpiper. An 

 ashy wash on the jugulum is hardly perceptible except in young birds, and 

 then it is slight ; the streaks are very numerous, broad and distinct, extending 

 as specks nearly or quite to the bill, and as shaft- lines along the sides. 



HAB. Eastern Province of North America, breeding in the high north. In 

 winter, the West Indies, Central and South America, south to the Falkland 

 Islands. Occasional in Europe. 



Nest, a depression in the ground, lined with grass and a few withered leaves. 



Eggs, three or four, light olive-brown, spotted with deep dark chestnut. 



Several of our Sandpipers resemble each other so much in general 

 appearance that by the gunner they are considered as all of one sort 



