AMERICAN AVOSET. 27 



ed all desirable knowledge of these birds, I shot down five of them, among 

 which I unfortunately found three females. 



The nests were placed among the tallest grasses, and were entirely com- 

 posed of the same materials, but dried, and apparently of a former year's 

 growth. There was not a twig of any kind about them. The inner nest 

 was about five inches in diameter, and lined with fine prairie grass, different 

 from that found on the islets of the pond, and about two inches in depth, 

 over a bed having a thickness of an inch and a half. The islets did not 

 seem to be liable to inundation, and none of the nests exhibited any appear- 

 ance of having been increased in elevation since the commencement of in- 

 cubation, as was the case with those described by Wilson. Like those of 

 most waders, the eggs were four in number, and placed with the small ends 

 together. They measured two inches in length, one inch and three-eighths 

 in their greatest breadth, and were, exactly as Wilson tells us, "of a dull 

 olive-colour, marked with large irregular blotches of black, and with others 

 of a fainter tint." To this I have to add, that they are pear-shaped and 

 smooth. As to the time of hatching, I know nothing. 



Having made my notes, and picked up the dead birds, I carefully waded 

 through the rushes three times around the whole pond, but, being without 

 my dog, failed in discovering the young brood or their mother. I visited 

 the place twice the following day, again waded round the pond, and searched 

 all the islets, but without success: not a single Avoset was to be seen; and I 

 am persuaded that the mother of the four younglings had removed them 

 elsewhere. 



Since that time my opportunities of meeting with the American Avoset 

 have been few. On the 7th of November, 1819, while searching for rare 

 birds a few miles from New Orleans, I shot one which I found by itself on 

 the margin of Bayou St. John. It was a young male, of which I merely 

 took the measurements and description. It was very thin, and had probably 

 been unable to proceed farther south. Its stomach contained only two small 

 fresh- water snails and a bit of stone. In May 1829, I saw three of these 

 birds at Great Egg Harbour, but found no nests, although those of the Long- 

 legged Avoset of Wilson were not uncommon. My friend John Bachman 

 considers them as rare in South Carolina, where, however, he has occasion- 

 ally seen some on the gravelly shores of the sea islands. 



On the 16th of April, 1837, my good friend Captain Napoleon Coste, 

 of the United States Revenue Cutter the Campbell, on board of which I then 

 was, shot three individuals of this species on an immense sand-bar, inter- 

 sected by pools, about twelve miles from Derniere Island on the Gulf of 

 Mexico, and brought them to me in perfect order. They were larger, and 

 perhaps handsomer, than any that I have seen; and had been killed out of a 



