PLATE CLXXIII. 



One of thefe laft- mentioned birds is now in our own poffefiion : it 

 differs in no material particular from the original bird, wliich is at 

 prefent before us, and with which we have compared it with due at« 

 tention ; the only diffimilarity confifts in the general hue of the upper 

 parts of the plumage, in the more recent fubjea being fomewhat darker, 

 and the lower more deeply rufo-ferriiginous. 



Notwithftanding the apparent fcarcity of this kind of Sandpiper, it 

 fliould be remarked however, that there is feme reafonable grounds 

 for believing, that it is only rare to us in this more lively ftate of 

 plumage; that in its ordinary drefs we fhould recognize it to be no 

 other than the Tringa Canutus, the bird familiarly known to our 

 poulterers by the name of the Knot-bird. This idea was firft fug- 

 gelled by the appearance of one of the Knot-birds, which we met with 

 fome years ago among a parcel of the common kind in Leadenhall 

 market. The whole of the lower furface had affumed a richly varied 

 intermixture of brown with the white feathers, and dufky crefcent-like 

 marks of the neck, breaft, and fides of the abdomen ; and befides 

 this fpecimen, there was another, the breaft of which had began to 

 afiiime the fame ruddy afpe6l. The correfpondence in this refpeiSt was 

 ftriking ; but there was nothing in the upper furface of tlie plumage 

 to diftinguifli it from the common Knot ; unlike the true Icelandic 

 Sandpiper, it was entirely deilitute of that elegant intermixture of 

 black and oblong fpots of ruft colour, which appears confpicuous in 

 the example we have reprefented, and which Linnaeus confidcrs 

 chara6ieriftic of the Iceland fpecies. 



Thefe laft-mentioned birds were placed in the fpring of 1 8 1 C, w ith 

 other varieties of the Knot-bird, in our Mufeum, in a fituation imme- 

 diately contiguous to the original fpecimen of the Red Sandpiper, in 



B 2 order 



