185 
eges. The appearance of these birds is attractive, their long 
orange razor-like beak, long wings, and curious skimming flight, 
ever and anon dipping their lower mandible under water, their odd 
shuffling gait when walking on the sand, as if they scarcely knew 
what to do with their beak, and apparent difficulty in arranging 
their long swift-like wings, their curious chattering notes when they 
assemble on some spit of sand at the water’s edge,—all these points 
attract any one fond of natural history. 
I first noticed these birds on a mud-bank in the river in the month 
of January. On visiting the same place in April, I found them on 
a sand-bank higher up, and suspecting this to be their breeding- 
time, was conveyed over the water to the bank. Onreaching it and 
narrowly inspecting the ground, I found the remains of broken egg- 
shells ; after a further search, I was rewarded by finding four or 
five nests, also the nest of a Little Ringed Plover and Black-bellied 
Tern. The Rhynchops lays four eggs in a hole scraped in the 
damp sand and gravel. Those which I found were mostly near the 
water’s edge. In some nests I found young ones, and procured one 
young bird that was able to fly very fairly. Any one at all accus- 
tomed to the habits of birds might have told that they were nesting 
by their restlessness, and the vicious way in which they attacked all in- 
truders. I saw them buffet a large Plover that pitched on the bank, 
and boldly attack those insatiable pilferers of nests, the Crows. The 
very young birds, when first hatched, are covered with a whitey- 
brown down, spotted with dark spots. The curious square end of 
the beak is very marked. The legs and feet of a dirty greyish-brown. 
The eggs are rather more than 1} inch in length, by | inch and 
rather more than ;1,th in width, of a pale stone colour, spotted and 
blotched with grey and two shades of brown. 
I subjoin the description of a young bird that was able to fly, 
probably about six weeks or two months old. The beak (after the 
skin was dried) was of a dull brown tinged with orange; the under 
mandible sharp, as in the old bird, but scarcely longer than the 
upper. Feathers on the cheeks pale fawn colour, with a few dusky 
spots, those on the forehead much the same, but the dusky spots 
more visible; on the top of the head behind the eye, back of the 
neck, the feathers are dull black, with pale ferruginous edges ; lower 
part of the back of the neck whitish, with a broad brown bar, and 
tipped with pale ferruginous ; upper tail-coverts, some dusky black, 
with pale ferruginous edges, some ferruginous mottled with white ; 
tail-feathers, lower portion white, upper portion dusky, with a 
marked border of pale ferruginous ; primaries nearly black, with 
pale tips; smaller quill-feathers, lower portion dusky, upper nearly 
white; secondaries much the same, the white being much clearer ; 
greater coverts dusky, with whitish tips; tertials dusky, with pale 
ferruginous edges; the lesser coverts the same ; chin, throat, breast 
and belly, under tail-coverts white ; sides of the neck white, with a 
few dusky spots; legs and feet dirty orange-brown. 
No. CCXCVI.—ProceEEDINGS or THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
