8 CHARADRIUS WILSONIUS. 



seasons, and had never seen them before. How long they 

 remain on our coast, and where they winter, we are 

 unable to say. From the circumstance of the oviduct 

 of the female being 1 greatly enlarged, and containing 

 an egg half grown, apparently within a week of being 

 ready for exclusion, we concluded that they breed 

 there. Their favourite places of resort appear to be 

 the dry sand flats on the sea shore. They utter an 

 agreeable piping note. 



This species is seven inches and three quarters in 

 length, and fifteen and a half in extent; the bill is 

 black, stout, and an inch long, the upper mandible 

 projecting considerably over the lower; front, white, 

 passing on each side to the middle of the eye above, 

 and bounded by a band of black of equal breadth ; lores, 

 black ; eyelids, white ; eye, large and dark ; from the 

 middle of the eye backwards the stripe of white becomes 

 duller, and extends for half an inch ; the crown, hind 

 head, and auriculars, are drab olive ; the chin, throat, 

 and sides of the neck, for an inch, pure white, passing 

 quite round the neck, and narrowing to a point behind ; 

 the upper breast below this is marked with a broad 

 land of jet black; the rest of the lower parts pure 

 white; upper parts pale olive drab ; along the eL>. 

 the auriculars and hind head, the plumage, where it 

 joins the white, is stained with ran- terra sienna; all 

 the plumage is darkest in the centre ; the tertials are 

 fully longer than the primaries, the latter brownish 

 black, the shafts and edges of some of the middle ones 

 white; secondaries and greater coverts, slightly tipped 

 with white ; the legs are of a pale flesh colour ; toes 

 bordered with a narrow edge; claws and eml> of the 

 toes, black ; the tail is even, a very little longer than 

 the wings, and of a blackish olive colour, with the 

 exception of the two exterior feathers, which are 

 whitish, but generally the two middle ones only are 

 seen. 



The female differs in having no black on the forehead, 

 lores, or breast, those parts being pale olive. 



