30 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE BERMUDAS. 



were to be heard in the neighbourhood of the lighthouse ; 

 to-day, all was silent on those grassy hills. 



Mr. Taylor, an old resident of the West Indies, tells me 

 that in the Island of Antigua, in the month of September, 

 it is a common thing for gentlemen to go out with their 

 guns, and return, after a morning's sport, with thirty, forty 

 and fifty couple of Plover. These, he says, are of various 

 descriptions, but chiefly Golden Plover, such as we have in 

 Bermuda. He describes them as haunting the cane fields 

 and particularly the bays and uncultivated hills along the 

 coast. 



September Stk, 1847. — Late last night flocks of Plover 

 were heard piping their southerly course over these islands. 

 At Ireland Island they were also distinctly heard by 

 officers of the garrison. The night was fair, and starlight 

 only. 



I hear from Mr. Josiah Dickenson, who resided for many 

 years in the island of Antigua, that during the month of 

 September that island is annually visited by countless 

 flocks of Plover, which arrive from the north, and are pre- 

 cisely similar to those which visit Bermuda at this season, 

 and on one occasion, when the weather was dark and 

 stormy, they made their appearance in such multitudinous 

 flocks at St. John's — the chief town of the colony — that 

 the inhabitants were to be seen in every direction shooting 

 them from their doors and windows ; indeed, so very 

 numerous were these Plover that boys killed them with 

 sticks and stones, and shooting them soon ceased to be 

 considered sport. 



In ordinary seasons the flocks of Plover do not arrive in 

 such immense numbers, though they never fail of being 

 very abundant. On the arrival of these 'birds {Charadrius 

 marmoratus, of course) everyone turns out with his gun, 



