:i84 BRITISH BIRDS. 



HIRUNDO RIPARIA. 

 SAND-MARTIN. 



(Plate 17.) 



Hirundo riparia, Briss. Orn. ii. p. 506 (1760) ; Mnn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 344 (1766) ; et 

 auctorum plurimorum — Omelin, Latham, Temminck, {Bonaparte), Naumann, 

 {Begland ^ Gerbe), (Seuglin), (Newton), {Dresser), &c. 



Hirundo cinerea, Vieill. N. Diet. dUIist. Nat. xiv. p. 526 (1817). 



Cotyle riparia {Linn.), Boie, Isis, 1822, p. 550. 



Cotyle littoralis, Hemp. 8/- Ehr.Jide Lioht. Nomencl. Av. p. 61 (1854). 



The Sand-Martin is perhaps the least known of the Swallows, and is 

 very often overlooked, or confused with its larger and more showy relations. 

 From the peculiarity of its haunts, it is more local in its distribution than 

 the Swallow and the Martin; nevertheless it is found throughout the 

 British Islands, in some districts in immense numbers. It appears only 

 to visit the Channel Islands on migration ; but it is as common and as 

 widely distributed in Scotland and Ireland as in England. It breeds in 

 the Outer Hebrides and in the Orkneys, but is only seen occasionally in 

 the Shetlands, and has not been recorded from the Faroes. 



The Sand-Martin is a circumpolar bird, except that in Greenland the 

 severity of the climate appears to have driven it out of the country. In 

 Scandinavia its colonies are found as far north as lat. 70°; but in the 

 valleys of the Petchora, the Obb, and the Yenesay the most northerly 

 colonies are in about iat. 67°. , Middendorff found it on an island on the 

 Pacific coast of Asia, in Iat. 55°; and Dybowsky obtained it in Kamtschatka. 

 In North America it breeds from Behring's Straits to Baffin's Bay, up to 

 about Iat. 68°. South of these limits it breeds throughout Europe and 

 North Africa, and in Asia as far south as Palestine, Central Persia, 

 Turkestan, South Siberia, East Mongolia, Japan, and the northern half of 

 China. Very little is known respecting its winter- quarters ; but occasional 

 stragglers are met with in TeneriiFe ; and on the east coast of Africa it has 

 occurred at Zanzibar, and as far south as the Transvaal. In Asia it is 

 sparingly found during the cold season in India and Burma ; and the obser- 

 vations of TAbbe David tend to prove that it also winters in Central and 

 South China. On the American continent Dall found enormous colonies 

 in Alaska up to Iat. 65° ; and Richardson found it equally abundant at the 

 mouth of the Mackenzie river, in Iat. 68°. Its southern breeding-range 

 on this continent is not very accurately determined; but it is said to 

 winter in Mexico, and is found at that season in Central America and in 

 the valley of the Amazon. In the Ethiopian and Oriental Regions the 

 Sand-Martin has several allies, but none with which it is likely to be con- 



