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AMERICAN GOLDEN PLOVER. 



Charadrius marmoratus, Wagler. 



Besides the species described in the third volume, p. 627, and 

 which is identical with the Golden Plover of Europe, there is exten- 

 sively distributed in America another species, of which a brief de- 

 scription is here taken from specimens presented to me by Captain 

 Ross. Two of these specimens are of adult birds in their summer 

 plumage, the other of a young individual. They seem to be of the 

 same size as British specimens, with which they are compared, and 

 in their form and proportions differ very slightly ; the tarsus of the 

 present species being slightly longer than that of the other, while the 

 toes are shorter. 



Bill black. Feet bluish-grey, claws dusky. The upper part of 

 the head, hind neck, and the upper parts of the body, are variegated 

 with brownish-black and bright yellow, the latter in spots along the 

 edges of the feathers. The quills and their coverts are dark greyish- 

 brown, the secondaries paler, the inner margined with yellowish-white 

 spots, the smaller coverts spotted with the same ; the tail-feathers are 

 greyish-brown, faintly banded with paler, the two central with margi- 

 nal yellowish spots. In another individual, the tail is destitute of bars, 

 the outer webs of the lateral feathers only being marked with yellow- 

 ish-white spots. A band across the forehead, extending on each side 

 over the eye, and down the neck, white, the rest of the lower parts 

 brownish-black, excepting the lower tail-coverts, which are chiefly 

 white, and the axillars and lower wing-coverts, which are light grey, 

 the axillars of the other specis being always white. 



Dimensions of a female preserved in spirits. Length to end of tail 

 10 inches, to end of wings 11, to end of claws 11^*2 ; wing from flexure 

 7 1*2 ; tail 2x2; extent of wings 22 J ; bill along the ridge \^ ; along the 

 edge of lower mandible 1 inch ; bare part of tibia | : tarsus 1^^ ; inner 

 toe i\, its claw i<i ; middle toe 1 inch, its claw {^ ; outer toe xV, its 

 claw ^\. 



As in all the species of this group, the mouth is exceedingly narrow, 

 it being in the present only 4 twelfths in width ; and the mandibles are 



