374 Charadriadce. 



in its own haunts speak of its fearless manner and familiar 

 habits. Others find it not so easy to approach by walking 

 straight up to it, but say that it will squat if one makes a circuit 

 round it, gradually lessening the distance, and will then allow 

 itself to be trodden upon before taking wing* Mr. O. Salvin 

 found it on the tablelands of the interior of the Eastern Atlas, 

 frequenting the salt-lakes and freshwater marshes, and gives the 

 following graphic description of its behaviour : ' When in 

 proximity to their nests, the whole flock come wheeling and 

 screaming round, while some dart passionately down to within a 

 few feet of the intruder's head, retiring again to make another 

 descent. When the first transports of excitement are over, they 

 all alight, one by one, on the ground. Some stand quite still, 

 watching with inquiring gaze; while others stretch themselves 

 out, first expanding one wing, then the other, and sitting down 

 extend both legs. In this position they remain some seconds, as 

 if dead, when suddenly springing up, they make another circuit 

 overhead, and the v/hole flock passes quietly away. The bird 

 makes no nest, but deposits its three eggs in a slight depression 

 of the bare sand. The eggs are usually placed with their axes 

 parallel.! 



135. CREAM-COLOURED COURSER (Cursorius 

 isabellinus). 



It is somewhat strange that the second species of this family 

 should also have occurred in Wiltshire, inasmuch as it is one of 

 the very rarest of the accidental visitors to this country, the 

 straggler whose appearance I will now relate being only the fifth 

 individual whose occurrence in Great Britain had then been 

 recorded. It was met with by Mr. Walter Langton, of Wands- 

 worth, Surrey, when out shooting on the estate of Mr. Stephen 

 Mills, at Elston, near Tilshead, on Salisbury Plain, on October 2nd, 

 1855 (very near the same spot where the Pratincole, last described.- 

 was found). It was first seen on an open piece of down land 



Lord Lilford in Ibis for 1860, p. 239. 

 f O. Salvin in Ibis for 1859, p. 355. 



