3450 The Zoologist — March, 1873. 



plenty of food, supplied either by the water or by the laud, or by both, for 

 their nourishment and that of their progeny. Now the creatures I mean 

 are many kinds of birds, and it may be worth while to give a short account 

 and to sketch the movements of one of them called the knot — the Tringa 

 Canutus of ornithologists. This bird is something half way between a snipe 

 and a plover. Examples of it are commonly to be seen in the cage at the 

 southern end of the Fish-House in the Zoological Gardens, and may be 

 seen there at the present time. Like many other kinds of birds belonging 

 to the same group, the colour of its plumage varies most wonderfully 

 according to the season of the year. In summer it is of a bright brick-red ; 

 in winter it is of a sober ashy gray. Kept in confinement it seldom assumes 

 its most brilliant tints, but some approach to them is generally made. Now 

 the knot comes to this country in vast flocks in spring, and, after remaining 

 on our coasts for about a fortnight, can be traced proceeding gradually 

 northwards till it takes its departure. People who have been in Iceland 

 and Greenland have duly noted its appearance in those countries ; but in 

 neither of them is it known to tarry longer than with us — the summer it 

 would there have to endure is not to its liking ; and as we know that it 

 takes no other direction, it must move further north. We then lose sight 

 of it for some weeks. The older naturalists used to imagine it had been 

 found breeding in all manner of countries, but the naturalists of the present 

 day agree in believing that we know nothing of its nidification. Towards 

 the end of summer, back it comes to us in still larger flocks than before, and 

 both old birds and young haunt our coasts till November ; if the season be 

 a very open one, some may stay later ; but our winter as a rule is too much 

 for it, and away it goes southwards, and very far southwards too, till the 

 following spring. What I have said of the knot in the United Kingdom is 

 equally true of it on the eastern shores of the United States. There it 

 appears in the same abundance and at the same seasons as with us, and its 

 movements seem to be regulated by the same causes. Hence, I think, we 

 may fairly infer that the lands visited by the knot in the middle of summer 

 are less sterile than Iceland or Greenland, or it would hardly pass over those 

 countries, which are known to be the breeding-places of swarms of water- 

 birds, to resort to regions worse off as regards supply of food. But the 

 supply of food must depend chiefly on the climate. Is there, then, beyond 

 the northern tracts already explored a region which enjoys in summer a 

 climate more genial than they possess ? The evidence furnished by the 

 knot would seem to answer this question in the affirmative, and it would be 

 easy to summon more instances from the same group of birds, tending to 

 show that beyond a zone where a rigorous summer reigns there may be a 

 region endued with a comparatively favourable climate. If so, surely the 

 conditions which produce such a climate are worth investigating. The 

 scientific man has the comfort of knowing that these conditions will be dis- 



