564 BARTRAM'S SANDPIPER. 



especially illuminated by the bright yellowish-red rump 

 and tail-coverts; and not least, as a mark of beauty, are the 

 bright red eye-lids. The youn^ in the down are a faithful 

 pattern of the colors of the mature bird. 



While your sympathies are being won by the sorrowful 

 demonstrations of the female, the male is equally active, 

 flying in circles about your head, running around you — he 

 is a very adept at running — and joining most earnestly in 

 the cries of the family. 



The young are true representatives of the precoces, run- 

 ning well as soon as free from the shell. A nest containing 

 eggs in the forenoon, in the afternoon may have nothing 

 but shells. The young are reared in the same kind of low- 

 lands and river-bottoms, as are chosen for nidification. In- 

 deed, such localities are the home of the species. The first 

 eggs are laid in May, and there may be another set in July. 



The Killdeer is well in favor with the farmer, not only 

 because of his familiar notes and spirited antics, but because 

 of his destruction of caterpillars and insects, and par- 

 ticularly of grasshoppers. Wintering abundantly in the 

 Southern and Southwestern States, it may extend even to 

 South America, breeding from Texas far into British North 

 America and to the Pacific. 



Plovers are a well-marked group of birds, differing from 

 the more numerous Snipes, Sandpipers, Tattlers, etc., in 

 the rather large head, the shorter bill and neck, and the 

 marked pigeon-like form of the bill, but more especially, 

 perhaps, in having only three toes, the exceptional hind 

 toe of the Black-billed Plover being only rudimentary. 



BARTRAll's SANDPIPER. 



By that powerful law of the mind — the association of ideas, 

 a bird always connected in my mind with the Killdeer, is 



