106 BRITISH BIRDS. 



regions are gay with flowers and abounding with birds. It is said to breed 

 on the open plain or tundra, and its nest is very slight, consisting of a 

 little hollow in the ground, lined with a few bits of dry herbage or one or 

 two withered leaves and bents. In this scanty cradle the female deposits 

 four eggs; but Richardson once observed a female sitting on three. I 

 have figured an egg of this bird which is in the collection of my friend 

 Mr. Crowley; it is pale olivaceous buff in ground-colour, spotted and 

 blotched with light and dark brown, and with faint underlying markings 

 of greyish brown. In the series of eggs collected by MacFarlane near the 

 Anderson River, and now in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution 

 at Washington, the ground-colour varies from greyish buff to greenish 

 olive on the one hand and to huffish brown on the other. The overlying 

 spots are dark reddish brown, sometimes small, but generally bold, and 

 are usually most abundant, often confluent, round the large end of the 

 egg ; the underlying markings, generally conspicuous, are pale greyish 

 brown. The eggs are pyriform in shape, and vary in length from 2'12 to 

 1'9 inch, and in breadth from 1'5 to 1'33 inch. 



The Esquimaux Curlew slightly resembles the Whimbrel, but is only 

 about half the weight, each measurement being about a sixth less. The 

 differences of plumage attributable to sex are unimportant, and those 

 dependent on season are principally confined to the abrasion of the feathers 

 in late summer and late winter. The upper parts of the adult are dark 

 brown, streaked with bun on the head, neck, and wing-coverts ; spotted 

 with the same colour on the back, scapulars, and rump ; imperfectly 

 barred on the innermost secondaries, and completely barred on the upper 

 tail-coverts and tail. The underparts are pale chestnut-buff, unmarked on 

 the upper throat and the centre of the belly ; streaked with brown on the 

 lower throat, and with arrow-shaped markings of the same colour on the 

 breast, flanks, under tail-coverts, and under wing-coverts. The axillaries 

 are pale chestnut, barred with brown. Bill dark brown, paler at the base 

 of the under mandible ; legs and feet olive ; claws black ; irides hazel. 

 Young in first plumage differ in having the feathers of the back, rump, 

 scapulars, and innermost secondaries dark brown, with narrow pale buff 

 margins, and in having almost unspotted under tail-coverts, Young in 

 down appear to be undescribed. 



The Esquimaux Curlew can never be mistaken for the Whimbrel. In 

 addition to its smaller size, the absence of the white on the lower back and 

 rump distinguishes it in a moment; the eye-stripes and the mesial line on 

 the crown are also much less distinct than in the Whimbrel. 



