492 PLOVER LERIBE. 
lengths of the central and outer tail-feathers. The chief breeding-haunts are 
beyond the limits of forest; but in winter this species spreads over Europe, 
Northern India, the Malayan region, China, New Guinea, Mexico, and Central 
America. Finally, Wilson’s phalarope (P wilsoni), which breeds on the great 
lakes of North America, and migrates in winter as far south as Patagonia, differs 
from both the others in the greater length of its slender tapering bill, which 
exceeds an inch. 
The Hard-Billed The term sandpiper being a general one, applied collectively to 
Sandpipers and many members of the family, it is necessary to prefix the term hard- 
Ruts. billed to those of which we have now to treat. These birds are 
specially characterised by the nearly straight beak, and by the feathers of the 

RUFFS AND REEVES, 
forehead extending in advance of the angle of the gape. In length the beak is 
moderate, and it has its tip hard, and the nostrils slit-like and lateral. The first 
toe is always present; and the metatarsus (except in a Pacific species where they 
are absent from the greater portion of the back) is covered with scutes both before 
and behind; and some portion of the tibia is bare. In the long and pointed wings 
the first quill is the longest; but there is considerable variation in the form and 
number of the tail-feathers, which in the great majority of species are barred. 
The genus comprises about a score of species, of which a large moiety are repre- 
sented in the British Islands, and throughout the breeding-season are distributed 
over the boreal and temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, but in winter 
become collectively cosmopolitan. Frequenting moors, marshes, and tundras during 
the breeding-season, these familiar and pretty little birds resort to the sea-coasts 
in the winter throughout many portions of their range and are in the habit of 
