( 576 ) 

 SOLITARY SANDPIPER. 



TOTANUS CHLOROPYGIUS, ViEILL. 

 PLATE CCLXXXIX. Male. 



The only nest of this bird that I ever met with was placed in an ele- 

 vated part of the woods near Bayou Sara, on the margin of a small pond 

 scarcely ten yards broad, overgrown with low bushes, and cumbered with 

 fallen branches of trees. 1 1 was formed of grass and withered leaves, arrang- 

 ed without much care, and contained three eggs. Both birds were greatly 

 disconcerted, ran round me, and frequently alighted on the twigs and 

 branches with all the nimbleness of land birds, constantly throwing their 

 heads forward and vibrating their body and tail in the manner of the Louisi- 

 ana Water Thrush. The eggs measured one inch one eighth and a half in 

 length, seven and a half eighths in breadth ; the colour was greenish-yel- 

 low, with spots and patches of umber, more abundant arovuid the crown, 

 where the larger marks formed a conspicuous circle. I carried one of the 

 eggs home, and, on returning a few days after to the spot, found one of 

 the birds sitting, which proved to me that the great anxiety shewn at my 

 first visit was chiefly because the female was about to lay her last egg. 

 The male was absent, nor did it shew itself during my stay. About a 

 fortnight after I found the wings of one of the birds near the place ; the 

 eggs also were gone ; and I concluded that some quadruped, probably a 

 racoon, had committed the havock. No bird of this species was in the 

 neighbourhood. 



In the Fauna Boreali- Americana, Dr Richardson says that in high 

 northern latitudes these birds deposit their eggs on the bare sand, which is 

 another proof in addition to the many already given, that great differences 

 as to the mode of nestling may exist in the same species in different parts of 

 the country. Indeed, almost all the habits of this curious bird difl'er ac- 

 cording to the locality. In the Southern States, they are particularly fond 

 of low flat lands among deep woods and cane brakes, and rarely approach 

 ponds of any great extent, but prefer those which are small and most se- 

 cluded. In the Middle Districts I have found them along the Leigh- 

 high, and in watery places both on low and on elevated ground. In the 

 State of Maine they frequented similar localities. In the prairies of In- 



