224 
THE PIPING PLOVER, 
and at times associate with other species, particularly the Turnstone, in 
whose company I have found them abundantly on the coast of Florida, in 
the winter months. They never proceed to any distance inland, even along 
the sandy margins of our largest rivers ; nor are they seen along very 
rocky shores or places covered with deep mud. 
The favourite breeding stations of this species are low islands, mostly 
covered with drifting sand, having a scanty vegetation, and not liable to 
inundation. In such a place many pairs may be found, with nests thirty or 
forty yards apart. The nest is sometimes placed at the foot of a tuft of 
withered grass, at other times in an exposed situation. A cavity is merely 
scooped out in the soil, and there are deposited in it four eggs, which are in 
a great measure hatched by the heat which the sand acquires under the in- 
fluence of a summer sun ; but in rough weather, and always by night, the 
female is careful to sit upon them. Her mate is extremely attentive to her 
during the period of incubation, and should you happen to stroll near the 
nest, you are sure to meet him at his station. The eggs, which are four, and 
have their points placed together, measure one inch and one-eighth by seven 
and a half eighths, are pyriform, broad, and flatly rounded at the larger end, 
and tapering directly to the smaller, which is also rounded. They are of a 
pale bluish-buff colour, sprinkled and lined nearly all over with dark red, 
brown, and black. Only one brood is raised in the season. The young 
which go abroad immediately after they are hatched, run with remarkable 
speed, and, at the least note of the parent bird indicative of danger, squat so 
closely on the sand that you may walk over them without seeing them. 
Their downy covering is grey, mottled with brown ; their bill almost black. 
If taken up in the hand, they emit a soft plaintive note resembling that of 
the old bird. The strange devices which their parents at this time adopt to 
ensure their safety, cannot fail to render the student of nature very unwilling 
to carry them off without urgent necessity. You may see the mother, with 
expanded tail and wings trailing on the gz’ound, limping and fluttez’ing before 
you, as if about to expire. It is true you know it to be an artifice, but it is 
an artifice taught by matezmal love ; and, when the bird has faizdy got rid 
of her unwelcome visiter, and you see her start up on her legs, stretch forth 
her wings, and fly away piping her soft note, you cannot but participate in 
the joy that she feels. 
The flight of this Plover is extremely rapid, as well as pz’otracted. It 
passes through the air by glidings and extended flappings, either close over 
the sand, or high above the shores. On the ground, few birds are swifter 
of foot. It runs in a straight line before you, sometimes for twenty or thirty 
yards, with so much celerity, that unless you have a keen eye, it is almost 
sure to become lost to your view. Then, in an instant it stops, becomes 
