ROCK riPIT. 
229 
INSESSORES. 
DENTIROSTRES. ANTHIDM. 
PLATE XC. 
ROCK PIPIT. 
Anthus aquaticus. {Selby.) 
The Pipits, a small group next to be described, and con¬ 
sisting but of four species belonging to this country, are 
nearly allied in habits, and manners, to the wagtails; feeding 
upon the same kinds of food, and living, like them, chiefly in 
situations of an open character, such as fields, and plains, and 
the gravelly shores of rivers. They are also closely allied to 
the larks, and resemble these latter much in form and plu¬ 
mage, in the construction and position of their nests, and in 
the character of their eggs : they appear, therefore, properly 
placed between the two. The generic distinctions, in point of 
form, between the wagtails and the pipits are slight, except 
in the tail, which in the wagtails is long and even at the 
end, and in the pipits shorter and forked. 
The Rock Pipit is in this country exclusively a maritime 
bird, and such it was considered by Montagu, who first dis¬ 
tinguished it from the other pipits, and described it as the 
dusky lark. That acute naturalist observed it first on the 
rocky coast of South Wales; and it has since been ascer¬ 
tained to inhabit most parts of the shores of England, Scot¬ 
land, and Ireland, as well as the islands of Shetland and 
Orkney. 
