242 
General Notes. 
As I approached the spot I saw a bird dart out from the moss and 
fly swiftly away. I noticed a rather inconspicuous hole in the moss, 
and looking in saw the eggs. Recognizing them by their resemblance to 
the other set, I retired a short distance and waited for the bird to come 
back. She returned in a few moments, and was soon joined by her mate, 
who, however, was disposed to remain rather more in the background. 
The female remained near the nest until I shot her, occasionally uttering 
her characteristic note of alarm, but without showing much anxiety. 
The nest, which is very bulky for the size of the bird, is a compact mass 
of the soft green moss that is so abundant in such places, with a few bits 
of arbor-vitse and one or two .sticks. It is thinly lined with slender stalks 
of grass and a few very fine roots. Its external diameter is four and a 
quarter inches, its depth four inches ; internally its diameter is two inches, 
its depth an inch and a half. The eggs, four in number, are white with a 
faint creamy tinge, and are marked, chiefly about the larger end, with 
spots and blotches of two shades of light reddish-brown, together with a 
few rather inconspicuous spots of lavender. Three of them have a few 
fine specks of black over the other markings. They measure .70X.54, 
.67 X .54, .67 X.53, .67 X .51. The eggs appeared to have been incubated 
for only a day or two. 
The nests and eggs that have been found in the past two seasons agree 
so closely in all respects as to render it probable, to say the least, that 
future sets will not vary much from them. Their number now seems suf- 
ficient to make one hesitate about admitting the identity of supposed nests 
of this species that differ widely from them in situation, structure, and in 
the appearance of the eggs. — Charles F. Batchelder, Cambridge , 
Mass. 
A Correction. — I beg to apologize for a singular blunder recently 
made in proposing to substitute the name Buteo aquilinus (Barton) for B. 
borealis (Gm.). I have “ always ” known, of course, that Falco borealis, 
Gm., 1788, was the name of the bird; but during a momentary lapse of 
memory I attributed the specific term to Vieillot, and so gave priority 
wrongly to Barton. (See Birds Col. Yal., I, 1878, p. 573, and Bull. Nutt. 
Club, IY, 1879, p. 84, foot-note. Also compare Proc. Phila. Acad. 1875, 
p. 344, foot-note.) — Elliott Coues, Washington, D. C. 
Wilson’s Plover on Long Island, N. Y. — On May 28, 1879, 
at Good Ground, Suffolk Co., Long Island (Shinnecock Bay), I shot a 
female Wilson’s Plover, YEgialitis wilsonia. It was identified and mounted 
by Mr. James Bell, who reported it very rare.- He said it was about six 
years since one had been recorded as far north as Long Island. This 
specimen was in very poor flesh. — Wm. Dutcher, New York City. 
The Black Skimmer (Rhynchops nigra) in New England. — The 
only record of this species occurring in New England was given by Lins- 
