AMERICAN AYOSET. 27 
ed all desirable knowledge of these birds, I shot down five of them, among 
which I unfortunately found three females. 
The nests were placed among the tallest grasses, and were entirely com- 
posed of the same materials, but dried, and apparently of a former year’s 
growth. There was not a twig of any kind about them. The inner nest 
was about five inches in diameter, and lined with fine prairie grass, different 
from that found on the islets of the pond, and about two inches in depth, 
over a bed having a thickness of an inch and a half. The islets did not 
seem to be liable to inundation, and none of the nests exhibited any appear- 
ance of having been increased in elevation since the commencement of in- 
cubation, as was the case with those described by Wilson. Like those of 
most waders, the eggs were four in number, and placed with the small ends 
together. They measured two inches in length, one inch and three-eighths 
in their greatest breadth, and were, exactly as Wilson tells us, “of a dull 
olive-colour, marked with large irregular blotches of black, and with others 
of a fainter tint.” To this I have to add, that they are pear-shaped and 
smooth. As to the time of hatching, I know nothing. 
Having made my notes, and picked up the dead birds, I carefully waded 
through the rushes three times around the whole pond, but, being without 
my dog, failed in discovering the young brood or their mother. I visited 
the place twice the following day, again waded round the pond, and searched 
all the islets, but without success : not a single Avoset was to be seen ; and I 
am persuaded that the mother of the four younglings had removed them 
elsewhere. 
Since that time my opportunities of meeting with the American Avoset 
have been few. On the 7th of November, 1819, while searching for rare 
birds a few miles from New Orleans, I shot one which 1 found by itself on 
the margin of Bayou St. John. It was a young male, of which I merely 
took the measurements and description. It was very thin, and had probably 
been unable to proceed farther south. Its stomach contained only two small 
fresh-water snails and a bit of stone. In May, 1829, I saw three of these 
birds at Great Egg Harbour, but found no nests, although those of the Long- 
legged Avoset of Wilson were not uncommon. My friend John Bachman 
considers them as rare in South Carolina, where, however, he has occasion- 
ally seen some on the gravelly shores of the sea islands. 
On the 16th of April, 1837, my good friend Captain Napoleon Coste, 
of the United States Revenue Cutter the Campbell, on board of which I then 
was, shot three individuals of this species on an immense sand-bar, inter- 
sected by pools, about twelve miles from Derniere Island on the Gulf of 
Mexico, and brought them to me in perfect order. They were larger, and 
perhaps handsomer, than any that I have seen ; and had been killed out of a 
