The Zoologist— Januarv, 1874, 3809 



high up on the hills, seldom by the shore, in the summer. They 

 occurred, however, on some islands in East Fiord, Wiide Bay ; and 

 the Swedes killed seventy-five brace in the spring on a low island 

 in IMossel Bay. Their favourite diet is buds and twigs of the polar 

 willow; but the crop of one bird contained grass, Draba seed, 

 Stellaria tops, and Polygonum blossom, besides willow leaves. 



Mgialites hiaticula (Ringed Plover). — Lieut. Chermside saw a 

 ringed plover in Wiide Bay, which attempted to entice him away 

 by shamming lameness, as if its nest was close at hand. 



Tringa maritima (Purple Sandpiper). — This species is common 

 in most of the places visited by us. It occurred at Table, Phipps's 

 and Walden Islands, as well as in North East Land. We obtained 

 a set of eggs, three in number, on the 3rd of July, in Treurenberg 

 Bay, and another set on the 16th in Albert Dirkes's Bay, where 

 I found also three newly-hatched young. These last were un- 

 fortunately killed by their mother when I flushed her. They lay 

 in a slight depression formed accidentally between some stones 

 which did not quite meet each other, utterly devoid of anything 

 resembling the rudiments of a nest. In the breeding season the 

 old birds have a peculiar habit of occasionally raising one of their 

 wings vertically over their back as they run along uttering their 

 cry. They do so more especially on alighting after a short flight. 

 At all times they are remarkably tame, and will continue to feed 

 within a iew yards of you. During the summer they disperse 

 themselves over the country, and may sometimes be met with on 

 the top of high hills, though their usual haunts are the borders of 

 streams and wet ground on the slopes between the sea and the 

 mountains. In such places they find plenty of insects amongst the 

 stones, and of small white worms in the softer soil. When the 

 frost sets in and the first snow covers the ground, they leave these 

 situations and endeavour to better themselves by the sea-side. 

 Here they may be seen sauntering about in small parties, eagerly 

 searching for food amongst the refuse rejected by the sea, until at 

 last they can put up with that style of living no longer, and 

 resolve to emigrate. Foxes meanwhile are going amongst them, 

 like popular agitators, acting the role of disinterested benefactors, 

 bent upon covertly maintaining themselves and their families at the 

 expense of the objects of their most sedulous attentions. 



Sterna macrura (Arctic Tern). — The arctic tern was of frequent 

 occurrence with us. In the lagoons by the shore considerable 



