182 AMERICAN OYSTER-CATCHER. 



take up a " razor-handle" or solen, and lash it against the sands until the 

 sheU was broken and the contents swallowed. Now and then they seem 

 to suck the sea-urchins, driving in the mouth, and introducing their bill 

 by the aperture, without breaking the shell ; again they are seen wading 

 up to their bodies from one place to another, seizing on shrimps and 

 other Crustacea, and even swimming for a few yards, should this be 

 necessary to enable them to remove from one bank to another without 

 flying. Small crabs, fiddlers, and sea-worms, are also caught by it, the 

 shells of which in a broken state I have found in its gizzard in greater or 

 less quantity. Frequently, while on wet sea-beaches, it pats the sand, to 

 force out the insects ; and in one instance I saw an individual run from 

 the water to the dry sand, with a small flounder in its biU, which it after- 

 wards devoured. 



This bird forms no regular nest, but is contented with scratching the 

 dry sand above high-water mark, so as to form a slight hollow, in which 

 it deposits its eggs. On the coast of Labrador, and in the Bay of 

 Fundy, it lays its eggs on the bare rock. When the eggs are on sand, 

 it seldom sits on them during the heat of the sun ; but in Labrador, it 

 was found sitting as closely as any other bird. Here, then, is another 

 instance of the extraordinary difference of habit in the same bird under dif- 

 ferent circumstances. It struck me so much that had I not procured a 

 specimen in Labrador, and another in our Middle Districts, during the 

 breeding season, and found them on the closest examination to be the 

 same, I should perhaps have thought the birds different. Everywhere, 

 however, I observed that this bird is fond of places covered with broken 

 shells and drifted sea- weeds or grasses, as a place of security for its eggs, 

 and where, in fact, it is no very easy matter to discover them. The eggs 

 are two or three, measure two inches and one-eighth in length, by an inch 

 and a half in breadth, and are of the form of those of a common hen. 

 They are of a pale cream colour, spotted with irregular marks of brown- 

 ish-black, and others of a paler tint, pretty equally dispersed all over. 

 The birds, even when not sitting on them, are so very anxious about them, 

 that on the least appearance of an enemy, they scream out loudly, and if 

 you approach the nest, fly over and around you, although always at a 

 considerable distance. When you meet with the young, which run as 

 soon as they are hatched, the old birds manifest the greatest anxiety. 

 They run before you, or fly around you, with great swiftness, and emit 

 peculiar notes, which at once induce their little ones to squat among the 



