232 
SCOLOPACIDyE. 
its tarsi were of a greyisli-greeii colour. A fine adult reeve was 
obtained on the 24th of August, 1835, on the shore of the bay; 
and five others were subsequently procured that autumn, three of 
which (killed on the 23rd and 24th September) came under my 
examination : two were adult birds (one a male), and the other a 
young bird of the year ; — they were all shot singly. On the 
5th September, 1838, three appeared on the sea-shore, one 
of which was killed by a person who had obtained them several 
times. He remarks that they are partial to alighting on the 
little grassy patches rising above the beach in preference to the 
beach itself ; that, when disturbed, they fly high like snipes, and, 
like these birds, come suddenly down from a height in the air, and 
further resemble them by returning to the place whence they were 
sprung ; — so late as the 29th November that year (1838) three 
were seen. On the 10th of September, 1841, a ruif appeared in 
company with some redshanks on the shore, where on the 25th 
of September, 1842, two adult males were shot at Adams^ Point, 
and the same number likewise procured between the middle and 
end of September 1844. In 1845, one only — obtained on the 
borders of the bay at Garnerville on the 29th of October — was 
known to have been killed. On the 2nd of that month, in 1848, 
a reeve was procured at the same shot with four' or five knots, 
and was the only one of the species in the flock. 
AU my information on the ruff as an Irish species, is now 
given, from which it appears that the bird has not been met with 
by my correspondents on the southern or western coast, — a cir- 
cumstance which, at all events, implies its comparative rarity 
there. 
The ruff formerly bred annually in large numbers on the fenny 
eastern counties of England, but has now almost ceased to do 
so. I have not seen any record of its having ever bred in Scot- 
land or Ireland. It is now known to the three countries chiefly 
as an autumnal visitant, when passing southward from more nor- 
thern breeding-haunts. 
I do not know any bird that varies so much in size as the ruif. I have seen some 
young birds one-third less in dimensions than others killed at the same time, though 
