THE GREY PHALAROPE. 261 



law of those which they most nearly resemble, and have the 

 principal change in the colour of the naked parts. 



This beautiful species is a winter migrant, and not a very 

 common one in the south of England ; but it breeds around 

 several of the fresh-water lakes in Orkney and Shetland. The 

 nest is formed of grass, in the best concealment that the bird 

 can find near the margin of the water. 



THE GREY PHALAROPE (PhalctTOpUS lobdtus). 



This is also a very handsome species, but one which is 

 exceedingly rare in England, even as a winter visitant, and 

 hardly known to British observation in its breeding plumage. 

 It is very discursive, and breeds in the extreme north, our 

 voyagers having met with it on Melville Island ; and they 

 also say it summers among the icebergs in very high lati- 

 tudes. It is perhaps the most northerly bird, having any 

 decided characters of a land bird, which visits the British 

 shores. A figure of it in the breeding plumage, on a scale of 

 one-third the lineal dimensions, is given on the plate facing 

 page 1 ; but no specimen, in such perfect plumage as the one 

 of which that figure is a portrait, need be looked for even in 

 the most northerly of our islands. 



In winter, the rich reddish brown of the plumage entirely 

 disappears, and is replaced by white, more or less marked 

 with greyish ash on the sides of the breast near the turn of 

 the wing ; the buff on the margins of the coverts fades to 

 grey, as also does the general tint of the back ; the black on 

 the head changes to white; the white round the eye to 

 black ; the bill changes from yellowish to dusky, and the feet 

 become lead colour. In the extreme north, it is probable 

 that the whole winter plumage becomes pure white. 



In the perfect summer plumage, no specimen has been met 

 with in this country, though one old bird was found in 

 Wiltshire in August, with so much of the summer dress as 



