58 
SOLITARY SANDPIPER. 
The Solitary Sandpiper is eight inches and a half long, and 
fifteen inches in extent; the bill is one inch and a quarter in 
length, dusky, and yellowish green at its base ; nostrils pervious, 
bill fluted above and below ; irides dark, pupil large, and of a 
bluish black ; line over the eye, chin, belly and vent pure white ; 
breast white, spotted with pale olive brown ; crown and neck above 
dark olive, streaked with white ; back, scapulars and rump, dark 
brown olive, each feather marked along the edges with small round 
spots of white ; wings plain, and of a darker tint ; under tail-co- 
verts spotted with black ; tail slightly rounded, the five exterior 
feathers on each side white, broadly barred with black ; the two 
middle ones, as well as their coverts, plain olive ; legs long, slen- 
der, and of a yellowish green, in some specimens of a dusky green. 
Male and female alike in color. 
Since the above was written I have examined the descriptions 
of the Wood Sandpiper in the works of several European ornitho- 
logists, and a foreign specimen in Mr. Peale’s cabinet, and am in- 
clined to conjecture that our bird is no other than the former, the 
difference between them being no greater than what may be ob- 
served in several species common to both continents, but which are 
admitted by all naturalists to be identical. I the more readily 
yield to this opinion, from the circumstance of having lately shot 
two individuals of this bird, the tail feathers of which were all 
barred as above mentioned. This fact is important, inasmuch as 
it removes the only difference which I have been enabled to per- 
ceive between the two birds in question. 
