Piping Plover. 221 
than ordinary solicitude, the little Plovers making most vio- 
lent demonstrations and pleading piteously when they are 
approached. The mother employs all the well-known arti- 
fices, such as lameness, inability to fly, to draw the intruder 
away from the nest. The young run as soon as they leave 
the egg, and are great adepts at hiding, squatting, and re- 
maining motionless. Their downy plumage so assimilates 
them to the sand that unless they reveal themselves by 
moving, it requires a very keen eye to distinguish them from 
the numberless tufts that are scattered about the higher 
reaches of the beach. 
Although so essentially a bird of the sea-shore, yet in 
August many scores of these birds come up the Delaware 
River as far as tide-water extends, feeding upon the mud- 
flats and gravel-bars, and occasionally wending their way 
up along the courses of the creeks until they find them- 
selves well into the country. It is interesting to watch them 
as they runin and out among the little hills and hollows of the 
mud in quest of their prey. They are happy, light-hearted 
fellows, who do not begrudge, when some racy tidbit has 
rewarded their hunting, to pipe a few notes of thanks to Him 
who watches as tenderly over them as over the mighty lords 
of the earth. 
