RED-BACKED SANDPIPER. 
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Circle, and even breeding in that remotest of lands, the ever- 
wintry shores of Melville Peninsula. It likewise inhabits 
Greenland, Iceland, Scandinavia, the Alps of Siberia, and the 
coasts of the Caspian. In the southern hemisphere it some- 
times even wanders as far as the Cape of Good Hope, and is 
found in Jamaica, other of the West India islands, and Cayenne. 
In the autumn it is seen around Vera Cruz, and, with other 
Sandpipers probably, is exposed for sale in the markets of Mex- 
ico. At the same time many, as the Purres, in their winter 
dress, remain through the greatest part of the winter within the 
milder limits of the Union, frequenting at times in great num- 
bers the coasts of both Carolinas during the month of Feb- 
ruary, flitting probably to and fro with every vacillating 
change of temperature, being naturally vagabond and nowhere 
fixed for any considerable time until their arrival at the 
Ultima Thule of the continent, where they barely stay long 
enough to rear a single brood, destined, as soon as they are 
able, to wander with the rest and swell the aerial host, whose 
sole delight, like the untiring Petrels of the storm or the 
ambitious .Albatross, is to be in perpetual action, and are 
thus, by their associated numbers, obliged perpetually to rove 
in quest of their transient, periodical, and varying prey. 
In the Middle States the Dunlins arrive on their way to the 
North in April and May, and in September and October they 
are again seen pursuing the route to their hibernal retreat in 
the South. At these times they often mingle with the flocks 
of other strand birds, from which they are distinguishable by 
the rufous color of their upper plumage. They frequent the 
muddy flats and shores of the salt-marshes at the recess of the 
tide, feeding on the worms, insects, and minute shell-fish 
which such places generally afford. They are also very nimble 
on the strand, frequenting the sandy beaches which bound the 
ocean, running, and gleaning up their prey with great activity 
on the reflux of the waves. 
These birds when in their hibernal dress are seen, in con- 
junction with several species, sometimes collecting together in 
such flocks as to seem at a distance like a moving cloud, vary- 
