242 
CURLEW SANDPIPER. 
(those towards the outside paler and clouded) with 
white ; the under parts are pure white, tinged on 
the sides of the neck and upon the breast with pale 
wood-brown, having the shafts and a narrow streak 
in the centre of the feathers hair-brown ; the bill is 
proportionally long, being from one and a-half to 
one and seven -tenths in length, slender and slightly 
bending towards the point, which has gained for it 
its Curlew appellation ; this, with the legs and feet, 
are greenish-black. The season and state in which 
these birds were procured, induce us to consider 
them as in the plumage of the young, or in the 
state intermediate to assuming the complete winter 
dress, which, we believe, to be quite uniform, or 
very nearly so, above, without pale margins to the 
feathers, the tint hair-brown, glossed with purple. 
In the summer or breeding state this Sandpiper 
follows more nearly the colours of the Knot ; the 
bead, neck, and breast, are a rich chestnut or 
orange-red ; the feathers on the crown dark in the 
centre ; the back and scapulars are nearly black, the 
plumage cut into with pale orange-red, and tipped 
with yellowish-white, and the white on the rump 
and tail-coverts appears to become spotted and barred 
with black; the under parts are reddish- orange, 
becoming paler on the belly and vent, and are crossed 
with irregular bars of black. A skin from Mexico, 
in our possession, shows an intermediate state of 
plumage. 
