LONG-LEGGED SANDPIPER. 271 



a broad band from the mandible over the eye, the fore part of the neck, and 

 the rest of the lower parts, white. Quills and tail as in the adult, but lighter. 

 Length to end of tail 7f inches; extent of wings 14^. Weight If oz. 



LONG-LEGGED SANDPIPER. 



-^Tringa Himantopus, Bonap. 

 PLATE CCCXXXIV.— Adult in Spring and Winter. 



I have often spoken of the great differences as to size and colour that are 

 observed in birds of the same species, and which have frequently given rise 

 to mistakes, insomuch that the male, the female, and the young, have been 

 considered as so many distinct species. The Long-legged Sandpiper has 

 been treated in this manner, and has latterly reappeared under the name of 

 Tringa Douglassii, in the Fauna Boreali-Americana of my friends Richard- 

 son and Swainson. Bonaparte was, in truth, the first who described this 

 bird; and although some differences might be found between his specimen 

 and the one described in the work just mentioned, they are trifling compared 

 with those which I have observed between seven or eight individuals all 

 procured from the same flock at a single shot. It is strange that neither 

 Bonaparte nor Swainson have mentioned the sex of their specimen. 



On the morning of the 4th of April, 1837, while seated among the drift 

 wood that had accumulated on the southern shore of the island of Barataria, 

 forty miles from the south-west pass of the Mississippi, and occupied in 

 observing some Pelicans, I saw a flock of about thirty Long-legged Sand- 

 pipers alight within ten steps of me, near the water. They immediately 

 scattered, following the margin of the retiring and advancing waves, in 

 search of food, which I could see them procure by probing the wet sand in 

 the manner of Curlews, that is, to the full length of their bill, holding it for 

 a short time in the sand, as if engaged in sucking up what they found. In 

 this way they continued feeding on an extended line of shore of about thirty 

 yards, and it was pleasing to see the alacrity with which they simultaneously 

 advanced and retreated, according to the motions of the water. In about 

 three quarters of an hour, during all which time I had watched them with 

 attention, they removed a few yards beyond the highest wash of the waves, 



