CH ARABELLA. 321 



homes of most of the various species that have 

 hitherto claimed our attention, we have now to be- 

 take ourselves to the ooze and mud, for which the 

 greater part of our coast line is notorious, to the 

 soft and muddy banks of our rivers, streams and 

 ponds, to the swamps and bogs of the Brendon and 

 other wild hills, and especially to the great turf- 

 marshes which form so large a portion of a certain 

 district of our county. The present Order is a 

 much larger one in point of number of species than 

 the last, including as many as seventy-three British 

 species, out of which forty-two may be considered 

 as belonging to Somersetshire. The Charadridae or 

 Plovers are the first family which I have to notice : 

 of these eight species out of the fourteen British may 

 be considered Somersetshire : some are very nume- 

 rous, but mostly irregular and fitful in their appear- 

 ance, depending very much on the state of the 

 weather. 



GREAT PLOVER, (Edicnemus crepitans. The 

 Great Plover, Norfolk Plover, Stone Curlew, or 

 Thickknee as it is also called, seems occasionally to 

 have occurred in this county. There is one in the 

 Museum at Taunton amongst the birds in the collec- 

 tion formerly belonging to the late Mr. Beadon, of 

 Otterhead, and there is an entry in his note-book 

 saying it had been shot at Brown Down in the winter 

 of 1828 : this would appear to be rather an odd time 



