Genus— A C T I T I S . 
Actitis lUiger, Prodronms, p. 262, 1811 . . . . Type A. hypoleucos. 
Also spelt — 
Atii^ Cuvier, Rd^e Anim., 2nd ed., Vol. I., p. 632, 1829. 
Actitus Baker, Omith. Index, p. 145, 1835. 
Actites Newton’s ed. Blasius List Birds EOTope, p. 18, 1862. 
Tringoides Bonaparte, Giorn. Arcad. (Roma), Vol. LII., 
p. 57, 1831 Type A, hypoleiicos. 
Also spelt — 
Tryngodes Heine, Nomencl. Mus. Hein., p. 326, 1888. 
Trygoides id., ib. 
Chiinetta Gray, List Genera Birds 1840, p. 68 . . Type A, hypoleucos. 
Smallest Totanine Waders with short straight bills, long wings, long tail, 
short legs, and long toes. The culmen is short, straight, and slender with the 
groove in the upper mandible extending three parts its length ; the culmen 
is scarcely longer than the metatarsus, which is about equal to the middle toe 
and claw ; the interramal space is feathered. 
The long wings have the first primary longest. The tail is long, rounded 
and about half the length of the wing or twice the length of the culmen. The 
metatarsus is regularly scuteUate in front and behind and about equal to the 
middle toe and claw in length; the exposed portion of the tibia is less than 
half the length of the metatarsus. 
The toes are long and a basal web connects the outer and middle, an 
indistinct web joining the middle and inner toe. Long hind toe present. 
The generic name used is that employed by the American Ornithological 
Union, probably following Stejneger : most British ornithologists have pre- 
ferred Tringoides, The facts are quite simple and seem almost beyond 
argument. lUiger proposed Actitis with a number of species, one of which 
was hypoleucos Linne ; eleven years afterwards Boie used it for that species 
alone, distributing the other species included by lUiger in other genera. 
Bonaparte later proposed Tringoides for Actitis Boie, not Actitis Illiger ; but 
as Boie’s species was one of Illiger’s, that statement seems incorrect. Later, 
probably unmindful of Bonaparte’s action. Gray also introduced Guinetta on 
the same grounds. The only argument that can be raised against the present 
usage is that lUiger simply utUised Actitis as a substitute-name for an earUer 
% 
214 
