270 SUMMER. 



the hope of capturing the bird alive is very apt to 

 tempt one to go after it. Even if the male do not 

 succeed, the female has time to run from the nest, and 

 she practices exactly the same manreuvres. We have 

 seen dottrels, in pairs, playing nearly the same tricks, 

 and we always believed their nest was near. 



The nest is quitted almost the instant that the young 

 are out of the shell ; for, though they be some time in 

 acquiring their plumage of flight, they run ; and in the 

 green plover, (and, we presume, in the dottrel also,) 

 the old birds do not feed the young, but lead them to 

 those places where they can feed themselves. The 

 feeding of both old and young is mostly done in the 

 mornings and evenings, and the young repose in the 

 heat of the day, by cowering down in places where they 

 are not easily seen, while the parents take, after the 

 manner that has been noticed, the attention of any 

 enemy that comes after they have left the nest. It is 

 probable that the young of the two species, which are 

 seen only by snatches, are so like each other that the 

 whole of the brood are given to the one that is best 

 known ; and as they grow fast, and have left the up- 

 lands before the sportsmen go there, there are not 

 many who attend to their habits. 



The green plovers migrate as well as the dottrel, 

 only it is doubtful whether any of them leave the 

 island. Their food seems to be limited to soft worms 

 and larvse; and, therefore, they always move to places 

 where these may be obtained. Accordingly, the 

 country people speak about plover storms, and dottrel 

 storms, as well as about lapwing storms. There is no 

 doubt that they are more likely to rest in their migra- 

 tions, and, therefore, to be more seen when the ground 



