AMERICAN AVOSET. 217 
with tape-worms, and a number of smaller bot-like worms, some 
of which wallowed in the cavity of the abdomen. 
In Mr. Peale’s collection there is one of this same species, 
said to have been brought from New Holland, differing little in 
the markings of its plumage from our own. The red brown on 
the neck does not descend so far, scarcely occupying any of the 
breast; it is also somewhat less.* 
In every stuffed and dried specimen of these birds which I 
have examined, the true form and flexure of the bill is altogether 
deranged; being naturally of a very tender and delicate substance. 
Note . — It is remarkable, that, in the Atlantic states, this 
species invariably affects the neighbourhood of the ocean; we 
never having known an instance of its having been seen in the 
interior; and yet captain Lewis met with this bird at the ponds, 
in the vicinity of the Falls of the Missouri. That it was our 
species, I had ocular evidence, in a skin brought by Lewis him- 
self, and presented, among other specimens of Natural History, 
to the Philadelphia Museum. See History of Lewis and 
Clarke’s Expedition, vol. ii, p. 343. G. Ord. 
* This is a different species; it is the R. rubricollis of Temminck, Manuel 
d’Ornithologie, p. 592. 
VOL. III. F f 
