236 
allen’s naturalist’s library. 
THE rURPLE SANDPIPERS. GENUS ARQU.VTELLA. 
Arquatella, Baird, B. N. Amer. p. 717 (1858). 
Type, A. maritima (Gm.). 
The genus Arquatella is very closely allied to the genus 
Tringa, and is considered by most ornithologists to be identical 
with it. The Purple Sandpiper, however, is a very short-legged 
bird, and differs from the Dunlins in having the tarsus shorter 
than the middle-toe. The tibia-tarsus, too, which is bare in 
the Dunlins, is feathered down to the joint of the tarsus in the 
genus Arquatella. Besides the ordinary Purple Sandpiper 
there are two races which are closely allied to it, A. couesl, from 
tlie Aleutian Islands and Alaska, and A. ptilocueniis, from the 
Prybilof Group. 
I. THE PURPLE SANDPIPER. ARQUATELLA MARITIMA. 
Tringa maritima, Gm. Syst. Nat. i. p. 678(1788); Macgill. 
Brit. B. iv. p. 197 (1852); Seebohm, Hist. Brit. B. iii. p. 
. 192 (1885). 
Tritiga striata, Linn. ; Dresser, B. Eur. viii. p. 69, pi. 554 
(1877); B. O. U. Lilt Brit. B. p. 171 (1883); Saunders, 
ed. Yarrell, Brit. B. iii. p. 408 (1883); id. Man. Brit. B. 
p. 579 (1889) ; Lilford, Col. Pig. Brit. B. part xxiv. 
(1893). 
Adult in 'Winter Plumage. — General colour above sooty-black 
with a purplish gloss, the feathers having pale margins of dull 
ashy-grey, less distinct on the lower back, rump, and upper 
tail-covert.s, the longest of which have white tips; sides of rump 
and lateral upper tail-coverts white, with narrow blackish shaft- 
lines; wing-coverts like the backand having thesamepale fringes; 
bastard-wing and jirimary-coverts black, with white tips ; quills 
dusky-brown, black along the outer web and at the tip of the 
inner one, the secondaries tipped with white and having a con- 
siderable amount of while on the inner web, which increases 
in extent on the inner secondaries, which are entirely white or 
have only a small mark of black on the outer web ; the inner- 
most secondaries black ; centre tail-feathers blackish, the 
remainder ashy-grey, fringed with white and having whitish 
shafts ; head and neck uniform sooty-black, with a faint streak 
