302 BIRDS OF THE WEST OF SCOTLAND. 



infer that it is but a small specimen of the Greenshank of this 

 country. As far as my observations have extended and I have 

 examined upwards of fifty specimens the adult Greenshank is 

 subject to great variation in size, whether we take into account 

 the bill, wings, or tarsi; so that, on this ground alone, Mr 

 Audubon's specimen has been invested with an importance to 

 which it was clearly never entitled. It is certainly not a little 

 remarkable that no other American specimen has yet turned up. 



THE AVOCET. 

 RECURVIROSTRA AVOCETTA. 



NOT found on the west coast. Dr Edmonston has mentioned that 

 it is an occasional visitant in Orkney; and I have been informed 

 by Professor Dickie of Aberdeen that a specimen was shot on the 

 Old Links near that city in 1841 by Mr Mitchell, who presented 

 the bird to the late Dr Fleming.* Of late years the only specimen 

 that has occurred to my knowledge is one that was shot on the 

 sands of Kirkcaldy in Fifeshire, by Mr John Wilson of that town, 

 in the second week of August, 1862. The Avocet may occasionally 

 stray into our estuaries especially on the east coast; and a careful 

 watching in such localities would doubtless be the means of re- 

 cording other examples. At present it can only be catalogued as 

 an extremely rare bird in Scotland. 



This beautiful bird has now become rare even in the south, 

 where up to the commencement of the present century it existed 

 in considerable flocks. In the Fens of Lincoln, "opposite to 

 Fossdyke wash, during summer," writes Pennant, " are great 

 numbers of Avosettas, called there yelpers, from their cry: they 

 hover over the sportsman's head like the lapwing, and fly with 

 their necks and legs extended." 



Modern records in the death catalogue of London magazines are 

 now confined to simple notices of the bird's destruction. 



* Dr Fleming, in his work on ' British Animals,' states that the Avoset is 

 "a straggler in Scotland," and as this book was published in 1827, we are led 

 to infer that Mr Mitchell's specimen was not the only one he had passed 

 through his hands. 



