282 
LITTLE SANDPIPER. 
necessity afterwards call for it, to guide you around tbe place until you have 
discovered the nest which you are desirous of seeing. 
Through these means, on the 20th of July, 1833, 1 after some search found 
the nest and eggs of this species. The birds flew, to use the words of my 
Journal, like Partridges, and not like Tringas. I marked them well, for 
both the female and the male flew from near the nest, and having left my 
fisher’s hat where I then stood, I walked carefully over the moss hither "and 
thither, until at last I came upon the spot. My pleasure would have been 
greatly augmented had any of my young companions been near ; but the 
sailors who had rowed me to the foot of the rocks exhibited little more de- 
light than they would have done on finding that their grog had been stopped. 
For my part, I felt as happy as when, on the same coast, I for the first time 
saw the nest and eggs of the Black-crowned Warbler. Four beautiful eggs, 
larger than I had expected to see produced by birds of so small a size, lay 
fairly beneath my eye as I knelt over them for several minutes in perfect 
ecstasy. The nest had been formed first, apparently, by the patting of the 
little creature’s feet on the crisp moss, and in the slight hollow thus produced 
were laid a few blades of slender dry grass, bent in a circular manner, the 
internal diameter of the nest being two inches and a half, and its depth an 
inch and a quarter. The eggs, which were in shape just like those of the 
Spotted Sandpiper, Totanus macularius, measured seven and a half eighths 
of an inch in length, and three-fourths of an inch in breadth. Their ground 
colour was a rich cream-yellow tint, blotched and dotted with very dark 
umber, the markings larger and more numerous towards the broad end. They 
were placed with their pointed ends together, and were quite fresh. The 
nest lay under the lee of a small rock, exposed to all the heat the sun can 
afford in that country. No sooner had the little creatures felt assured that I 
had discovered their treasure, than they manifested a great increase of sor- 
row, flew from the top of one crag to another in quick succession, and emit- 
ted notes resembling the. syllables peep, peet, which were by no means agree- 
able to my feelings, for I was truly sorry to rob them of their eggs, although 
impelled to do so by the love of science, which affords a convenient excuse 
for even worse acts. 
This pair, however, would seem to have been late in depositing their eggs, 
for on the 4th of August my party and myself saw young birds almost as 
large as their parents, and agreeing in almost every point with the descrip- 
tions given of Tringa Temminc/cii. Many small flocks of these birds, 
consisting of old and young, were already departing from Labrador, and were 
seen on all our excursions. On the 11th of August, we also found adult and 
young in great numbers. But not a single newly hatched individual of this 
