90 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



series of flights towards her young, and, when on the ground, 

 dragging her wings and making a peculiar squawking noise, 

 corning so close to us that I could have caught her quite easily. 

 It was then that this beautiful Sandpiper could be seen to 

 advantage. We did not find the other members of her family, 

 though they could not have been far off. They were most 

 difficult to see, so beautifully did they harmonize with the 

 surroundings, especially with the moss that is found on the tops 

 of the mountains. It was on the following day that we found six 

 more lots of young, and, with the exception of one set, which 

 had not left the nest, were all apparently about the same age, 

 and the parents displayed the same amount of anxiety as with 

 our first experience. We very carefully examined the nests 

 found; they were all exceptionally deep cup-shaped depressions, 

 slightly lined with fragments of moss and dead leaves of the 

 bilberry, and placed on the sheltered side of the mountain 

 tops, generally at the edge of the patches of moss. On June 13th 

 we saw three more birds, and watched them for some time, but 

 do not think they were nesting. The disappointment at not 

 seeing the eggs in situ was amply compensated for by the splendid 

 opportunities we had of examining the birds and their breeding 

 habits. The splendid series of eggs, nearly all taken in the 

 Faeroes, and now in the British Museum, are well worth a 

 visit. 



Eedshank (Totanus calidris). Native name, " Stelkur." — 

 We saw some eggs of this species in the School Museum at 

 Thorshavn, but we were unable to ascertain with any certainty 

 as to whether the}' had been found in the islands, though we 

 heard that all the eggs in this collection were supposed to have 

 been taken there. We did not find it breeding, and no birds 

 were seen. 



Whimbrbl (Numenius phceopus). Native name, " Spegvi." — 

 I must reluctantly add this to my already long list of species 

 that may be considered to have decreased ; that is to say, if I am 

 to rely upon previous writers upon the birds of the islands. They 

 were certainly in fair numbers, and were evenly distributed, but 

 to call them abundant would be to exaggerate. In comparison, 

 I have found Curlew {Numenius arquata) in considerably greater 

 numbers in Westmoreland, and seen as many nests of that species 



