RING PLOVER. 
153 
flute, which it utters while running along the sand, with ex- 
panded tail, and hanging wings, endeavouring to decoy you 
from its nest. The present species is never seen to breed here; 
and though I have opened great numbers of them as late as the 
twentieth of May, the eggs, which the females contained, were 
never larger than small bird-shot; while, at the same time, the 
light-coloured kind had every where begun to lay in the little 
cavities which they had dug on the sand, on the beach. These 
facts being considered, it seems difficult to reconcile such dif- 
ference of habit in one and the same bird. The Ring Plover is 
common in England, and agrees exactly with the one before 
us; but the light-coloured species, as far as I can learn, is not 
found in Britain; specimens of it have indeed been taken to 
that country, where the most judicious of their ornithologists 
have concluded it to be still the Ring Plover, but to have chang- 
ed from the efiect of climate. Mr. Pennant, in speaking of the 
true Ring Plover, makes the following remarks: “Almost all 
which I have seen from the northern parts of North America 
have had the black marks extremely faint, and almost lost. 
The climate had almost destroyed the specific marks; yet in the 
bill and habit preserved sufficient to make the kind very easily 
ascertained.” These traits agree exactly with the light-colour- 
ed species described in our fifth volume. But this excellent na- 
turalist was perhaps not aware that we have the true Ring Plo- 
ver here in spring and autumn, agreeing in every respect with 
that of Britain, and at least in equal numbers; why, therefore, 
has not the climate equally affected the present and the former 
sort, if both are the same species? These inconsistencies can- 
not be reconciled but by supposing each to be a distinct spe- 
cies, which, though approaching extremely near to each other, 
in external appearance, have each their peculiar notes, colour, 
and places of breeding. 
The Ring Plover is seven inches long, and fourteen inches 
in extent; bill short, orange coloured, tipt with black, front and 
chin white, encircling the neck; upper part of the breast black; 
rest of the lower parts pure white; fore part of the crown black; 
VOL. HI. — X 
