296 CHAKADKIID.E 



distinctly did the two species contrast in size that one was 

 reminded of a clutch of chickens racing after the mother. 

 On the same day I also observed parties of Stints, each 

 consisting of some fifteen to twenty individuals. All the 

 above-mentioned remained but a few days on the coast, 

 for on September 12th every one of them had departed. 



On September 9th, 1897, I observed a pair of immature 

 Little Stints running about on a grass-bank on the Dublin 

 coast. Several Pied Wagtails accompanied them. The 

 Stints were so tame that they little heeded a woman when 

 she wheeled a perambulator (in which sat a noisy and 

 fidgety infant) within a few paces of where they were feed- 

 ing. With the aid of a field-glass I have, on different 

 occasions, detected one or two Stints in a great assemblage 

 of Dunlins. 1 It is then often difficult to secure a specimen 

 of the former without sacrificing many lives of the latter. 2 

 Two Stints observed by Walter appeared very diminutive 

 when contrasted with a " lordly Black-backed Gull, which, 

 with head embedded in its shoulders, stood majestically 

 in repose, its dignity not unbending to admit even a look 

 at those little elf-like birds running about, apparently in 

 pursuit of sand-flies." The ' thousands of Stints ' we some- 

 times hear of as frequenting our shores are doubtless large 

 flocks of Dunlins, which are hopelessly confounded with 

 Tringa minuta by ornithologists of limited experience. 



The flesh differs but little from that of the Dunlin and 

 other small sea-side 'waders.' The few specimens which 

 I have tasted had a rather fishy flavour. English epicures, 

 however, formerly esteemed the flesh of several kinds of 

 shore-birds a delicacy ; thus we read : 



" The puet, godwit, stynt, 3 

 The pallat that allure 

 The miser, and doth make 

 A fearful epicure." 



1 Large flocks of Dunlins should be examined most carefully with a 

 binocular, for rare species often associate with them. 



2 Once I obtained a good specimen of a Little Stint by firing a charge 

 of fine shot into a flock of Dunlins as they flew past me, eleven of the 

 latter also falling to my gun. This method of securing a specimen I do 

 not advocate ; indeed I would not have pulled trigger at all had I not 

 seen previously quite a number of Stints among the flock of Dunlins on 

 the strand, i.e., before they took wing and flew past me. 



3 Dunlins in all likelihood. 



