174 BIRDS OF MIDDLESEX. 



Green Sandpiper seldom stays more than a month, 

 generally departing again in the third week of May, 

 as, I believe, to breed further north.* The period 

 occupied in journeying from this country to Lapland 

 or Sweden and back, and in rearing a brood of 

 young, appears not to exceed six or seven weeks ; 

 for I have seen this species in Middlesex on the 

 25th May and the 17th July. After the bird has 

 returned to us again in July, it appears in no hurry 

 to depart for some time. The duties of incubation 

 are over, the old birds are accompanied by their 

 young, and nothing but the cold of winter would 

 seem to drive these united families from our 

 shores. 



From July to November inclusively, I have ob- 

 served Green Sandpipers at the brooks and ponds, 

 and not unfrequently in wide ditches where a little 

 water is collected. Occasionally, though rarely, I 

 have known a Green Sandpiper killed in December 

 and January.! 



* On dissecting a female Green Sandpiper, shot on the 

 last day of April, I found rudimentary eggs in the ovary, 

 which strengthened the impression that this bird, like many 

 other of the Sandpipers, makes a resting-place of our waters 

 on its way to and from its breeding grounds. 



f The Rev. L. Jenyns, in his ' British Vertebrate 

 Animals,' referring to this bird, calls it " an occasional visitant 

 in this country, principally during the autumnal and winter 

 mouths, but scarcely to be called common." 



