OF THE SIBERIAN PECTORAL SANDPIPER. 
365 
a specimen procured in Java, is known to be a regular winter 
bird in Australia, breeding in Eastern Siberia, where it occurs 
plentifully; in Alaska it is met with in autumn. Mr. Seebohm 
gives its distribution as follows : he says examples have been 
obtained “in the middle of June in the valley of the Argun River, 
it has been observed on Bering’s Island during the autumn 
migration. It passes along the coasts of Japan and China, and 
lias been frequently obtained on many of the islands of the Malay 
Archipelago from Java to New Guinea. It winters in Australia 
and New Zealand.” I cannot find that it has previously been 
recognised in Europe. The occurrence of this species in England 
is certainly of considerable interest ; and Mr. Thomas Ground, of 
Moseley, near Birmingham, who was fortunate enough to shoot it, 
has favoured me with the following particulars of his meeting with 
it : “ I only saw the bird just as it alighted, and it did so in perfect 
silence ; it then remained quite still as if examining the ground, the 
other birds all took a short run. I fired on the instant, and it fell 
dead. The Ring-plover also fell to my friend’s shot at the same 
moment. The preciso locality was on the Breydon mud-flats on the 
end nearest Yarmouth, on one of the flats which are left dry, or nearly 
so, at high tide. The date was the 29th August. The tide had been 
running out about an hour. Had I recognised the bird as a stranger 
I should have taken care to have given it an opportunity of 
displaying itself.” Mr. Ground’s bird proved to be a female by 
dissection, probably fully adult ; the legs, when fresh, were olive- 
green ; the inside of the mouth flesh-coloured. The following 
comparative measurements of three of these birds — No. 1 from 
“ Australia,” No. 2 from New South Wales, and No. 3 the recently 
killed Breydon specimen — will show that individuals of this species, 
like the Pectoral Sandpiper, differ considerably in size. 
No. 1 . 
No. 2. 
No. 3. 
Bill along the culmen 
Wing — from flexure to end 
25 m.m. 
22 m.m. 
. 2 1 m.m. 
of first quill (the longest) 
135 m.m. 
. 137 m.m. 
. 129 m.m. 
Tarsus 
32 m.m. 
30 m.m. 
. 28 m.m. 
Middle toe and claw 
30 m.m. 
28 m.m. 
28 m.m. 
On comparing the principal measurements of the above three 
specimens of this bird with the averago of twelve examples of 
vol. v. c c 
