The Zoologist— June, 1873. 3545 



even thrive in the severest winters, after all the rest of the small 

 birds have been driven by frost and snow from the cold and exposed 

 marshes, where they feed on the seeds of various grasses picked 

 from the withered bents rising above the snow. They are always 

 excessively fat. 



The sand grouse {Syrrhaptes paradoxus) has visited the Lincoln- 

 shire coast in considerable numbers; early in December, 1863, a 

 flock of between forty and fifty was seen in the parish of Salt- 

 fleetby: about twenty of them were shot; and several other 

 instances of their occurrence in this district have been recorded. 



The golden plover (p. 88) is very numerous in the North Lincoln 

 and Holderness marshes during the winter. In mild winters they 

 remain in these marshes in enormous flocks: Mr. Cordeaux con- 

 siders the local migration of the golden plover very remarkable. 

 He says, " I have frequently noticed a day or two previous to hard 

 weather immense flocks crossing the Humber, often for hours 

 together, all of them going southwards. Besides local migrations 

 dependent on the weather, there are similar movements due to 

 other causes, the chief of which is probably a permanent change of 

 feeding-ground." A peculiarity of the golden plover, common also 

 to the peewit, is their extreme restlessness before wind and rain : 

 they will continue for hours flying to and fro over the marshes on 

 these occasions. Mr. Cordeaux remarks (p. 94) that independently 

 of their specific distinctness, the gray plovers (p. 93) differ from the 

 golden in their habits ; they leave the district, on the average, seven 

 or eight weeks later in the spring, and return fully ten months 

 earlier in the autumn: they are strictly marine birds; their 

 favourite haunts are the sea-coast and the muddy shores o'f large 

 tidal rivers, their presence inland being exceptional : it is exactly 

 the reverse with the golden plovers; they are rarely seen on the 

 flats, and indeed never, except very early in tlie season, when the 

 land is dry and hard: again, the gray plovers, when in small 

 parties, fly in a line one behind another: in large flocks they 

 fly all in a lump : the golden plovers, as a rule, advance in long 

 extended lines, but afterwards adopt the arrow-head form of 

 flight. 



The turnstone (p. 97) feeds in the summer-eaten clover on beetles 

 obtained by turning over the dried fragments of sheep-dung, thus 

 adopting the same course as the most astute and practical 

 entomologist; the various species of Coleopterous insects seem 



