THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
stooping carriage of the former, and the quick bobbing motion of the head 
and tail of the latter ; its olive-green plumage and long tertiaries also ally 
it to the Sandpipers.” 
The history of this species is given thus by Seebohm in the Geographical 
Distribution of the Charadriidoe, p. 109 : “ The Australian Four-toed Dotterel 
was originally described by Temminck {Cat. Syst. Cab. d’Orn., pp. 172, 259) 
in 1807 as Le Vanneau Nain de la Nouvelle Galle Meridionale, but it did not 
receive a Latin name until it was re-discovered by Gould, who called it the 
Red-Kneed Dotterel and gave it the scientific name of Erythrogonys cinctus. 
Lesson afterwards discovered that the genus was a hopelessly bad one, and 
that the new Australian species belonged to the same genus as the South 
American Dotterel to which he had given the same specific name. The 
Vanellus cinctus of Lesson, dating 1826, though superseded by Charadrius 
modestus of Lichtenstein, dating from 1823, nevertheless supersedes Erythro- 
gonys cinctus of Gould, dating only from 1837, so that Lesson was obliged 
to re-name Gould’s species.” 
This statement is not only partly inaccurate, but Seebohm’s treatment 
was also bad. He called the bird Charadrius rufiventris, and gave a plate of 
it. Assuming the above statement as correct, as Seebohm did not accept 
Lesson’s generic disposition in Vanellus, he should have reverted to Gould’s 
name. According to Seebohm, Lesson renamed Gould’s bird because he 
concluded it was a Vanellus ; but if it was not a Vanellus there was no need 
to reject Gould’s name. When I wrote up my Reference List ” [Nov. Zool., 
Vol. XVIII., p. 214, 1912), I accepted Seebohm’s statement but upon referring 
to the Echo du Monde Savant, I find that the above was written by Seebohm 
without any such reference. In the Echo du Monde Savant, 11th year, No. 9, 
col. 207, 1844, Lesson described as a new species, without anj^- comment whatever, 
Vanellus rufiventer. Consequently, Seebohm’s explanation was imaginary. 
As regards the early history of the bird Seebohm’s account may be accurate. 
In the History of the Collections of Natural History of the British Museum, 
Vol. II., p. 148, 1906, Sharpe identified the Watling Drawings, No. 249 
and 250, as being of this bird, but his identification was quite erroneous, the 
figures being beautiful representations of C. inelanops Vieillot ! ! 
Its late discovery and its peculiar features have combined to free it from 
nomenclatural troubles, the only synonym of Gould’s name being Lesson’s, 
as above noted. Instead of being a “ hopelessly bad genus,” as Seebohm 
expressed it, I consider it a peculiarly weU-characterised one, and its syn- 
onymy shows this up weU, as after Lesson’s description as a Vanellus it has only 
once been again referred to that genus, and that was by Schlegel, probably the 
greatest genus- and species-lumper ornithological science has yet possessed. 
37 
