94 
BIRDS. GRALLiE. 
aa. Tridactylce, 
b. Bill slender. 
Calidris, 
bb. Bill strong. 
c. Bill compressed. 
d. Bill swollen at the end. 
Charadrius. 
Oidicnemus. 
dd. Bill wedged shaped. 
Hsematopus. 
cc. Bill vaulted. 
Otis. 
In no department of British Ornithology does there exist so 
much confusion as among the Grallas, in reference to native 
species. Numerous stragglers, both from America and Europe, 
have been enrolled in our systematical catalogues as British 
subjects. Several species, which were formerly natives, but 
which, by the influence of civihzation, have been reduced to 
the rank of stragglers, still maintain their place as citizens, as if 
their geographical distribution had experienced no check. It 
is surely time to reduce these redundancies, and exhibit our list 
of native birds freed as much as possible from foreigners. Un- 
der the influence of these feelings, I judge it unnecessary to de- 
scribe formally the two following species. 
1. Glareola torquata. Austrian Pratincole. {Temm. Orn. ii. 500.) — This 
species, which may be readily distinguished from the other British Grallge, 
by its remarkably wide mouth, has twice occurred in this country. The 
first was shot near Ormskirk, in Lancashire, in 1807, and is now in the collec- 
tion of Lord Stanle}". The second was killed by Mr Bullock in Unst, the. 
most northerly of the Zetland Isles, on the 13th August 1812. — See Mont 
Orn. Diet. Suppt. and Lin. Trans, ix. 198, Bullock^ Lin. Trans, xi. 177* 
2. Platea Leucorodia. Common Spoonbill. {Temm. Orn. ii. 595.) — The 
thin, flat, enlarged extremity of the bill, is an obvious distinguishing mark of 
the species. It was first recorded hy Merret, (Pinax 181.) on the authority of 
Turner^ as inhabiting Lincolnshire ; and by Sibbald^ (Scot. 111. 18.) as an acci- 
dental visitant of Scotland. He states (Auct. Mus. Balf. 195.) having re- 
ceived it from Orkney. It has since been noticed by Pennant (Brit. Zool. ii. 
634.) as migrating, in a flock, into the marshes near Yarmouth, in Norfolk, in 
April 1774 — Pulteney^ (Dorset Cat. 14.) records it as accidentally a visitant of 
Dorsetshire. — Montagu (Orn. Diet. Supp.) mentions one shot in March, and 
another in November, at King’s-Bridge, Devonshire. It has likewise been 
shot in Zetland. 
