60 



SPOTTED SANDPIPER. 

 TRINGA MACULARIA. 

 [Plate LIX.— Fig. 1.] 



Arct. Zool p, 473, JVo. 385 — La Ginve d'cau, Buff. VIII, 140. — Edw. 277. — Peace's Museum^ 



JV'o. 4056. . 



THIS very common species arrives in Pennsylvania about 

 the twentieth of April, making its first appearance along the shores 

 of our large ri vers, and, as the season advances, tracing the courses 

 of our creeks and streams towards the interior. Along the rivers 

 Schuylkill and Delaware, and their tributary waters, they are in 

 great abundance during the summer. This species is as remark- 

 able for perpetually wagging the tail, as some others are for nod- 

 ding the head ; for whether running on the ground, or on the fences, 

 along the rails, or in the water, this motion seems continual; even 

 the young, as soon as they are freed from the shell, run about con- 

 stantly wagging the tail. About the middle of May they resort 

 to the adjoining corn fields to breed, where I have frequently 

 found and examined their nests. One of these now before me, 

 and which was built at the root of a hill of Indian corn, on high 

 ground, is composed wholly of short pieces of dry straw. The 

 eggs are four, of a pale clay or cream color, marked with large 

 irregular spots of black, and more thinly with others of a paler 

 tint. They are large in proportion to the size of the bird, mea- 

 suring an inch and a quarter in length, very thick at the great end, 

 and tapering suddenly to the other. The young run about with 

 wonderful speed as soon as they leave the shell, and are then co- 

 vered with down of a dull drab color, marked with a single streak 

 of black down the middle of the back, and with another behind 



