ASH-COLORED SANDPIPER. 
37 
adroitness they follow and elude the tumbling surf, while at the 
same time they seem wholly intent on collecting their food. 
The Ash-colored Sandpiper, the subject of our present ac- 
count, inhabits both Europe and America, It has been seen in 
great numbers on the Seal islands near Chatteux bay ; is said to 
continue the whole summer in Hudson’s bay, and breeds there, 
]Mr. Pennant suspects that it also breeds in Denmark ; and says, 
that they appear in vast flocks on the Flintshire shores during the 
winter season.* With us they are also migratory, being only seen 
in spring and autumn. They are plump birds ; and, by those ac- 
customed to the sedgy taste of this tribe, are esteemed excellent 
eating. 
The length of this species is ten inches, extent twenty ; bill 
black, straight, fluted to nearly its tip, and about an inch and a 
half long ; upper parts brownish ash, each feather marked near 
the tip with a narrow semicircle of dark brown, bounded by an- 
other of white ; tail-coverts white, marbled with olive ; wing quills 
dusky, shafts white ; greater coverts black, tipt with white ; some 
of the primaries edged also with white ; tail plain pale ash, finely 
edged and tipt with white ; crown and hind head streaked with 
black, ash and white ; stripe over the eye, cheeks and chin white, 
the former marked with pale streaks of dusky, the latter pure; 
breast white, thinly specked with blackish; belly and vent pure 
white; legs a dirty yellowish clay color; toes bordered with a 
narrow thick warty membrane ; hind toe directed inwards as in 
the Turn-stone; claws and eye black. 
These birds vary a little in color, some being considerably 
darker above, others entirely white below ; but, in all, the concentric 
semicircles on the back, scapulars, and wing-coverts are conspicuous. 
I think it probable that these birds become much lighter co- 
lored during the summer, from the circumstance of having shot 
VOL. VII. 
* Arct. Zool. p. 474. 
K 
