THE PURRE. 
69 
white, barred and spotted with black and pale ferru- 
ginous ; tail-coverts, white, elegantly barred with black ; 
wings, plain dusky, black towards the extremity ; the 
greater coverts, tipt with white ; shafts of the pri- 
maries, white; tail, pale ashy olive, finely edged with 
white, the two middle feathers somewhat the longest; 
belly and vent, white, the latter marked with small 
arrow-heads of black; legs and feet, black; toes, 
bordered with a narrow membrane ; eye, small and 
black. 
In some specimens, both of males and females, the 
red on the breast was much paler, in others it descended 
as far as the thighs. Both sexes seemed nearly alike. 
221 . TRINGA CINCLUS THE PURRE. 
WILSON, PLATE LVII. FIG. III. — EDINBURGH COLLEGE MUSEUM. 
This is one of the most numerous of our strand birds, 
as they are usually called, that frequent the sandy beach 
on the frontiers of the ocean. In its habits it differs 
so little from the preceding, that, except in being still 
more active and expert in running and searching among 
the sand, on the reflux of the waves, as it nimbly darts 
about for food, what has been said of the former will 
apply equally to both, they being pretty constant 
associates on these occasions. 
The purre continues longer with us, both in spring 
and autumn, than either the turnstone or the ash- 
coloured sandpiper ; many of them remain during the 
very severest of the winter, though the greater part 
retire to the more genial regions of the south, where 
I have seen them at such seasons, particularly on the 
sea coasts of both Carolinas, during the month of 
February, in great numbers. 
These birds, in conjunction with several others, 
sometimes collect together in such flocks, as to seem, 
at a distance, a large cloud of thick smoke, varying in 
form and appearance every instant, while it performs 
its evolutions in air. As this cloud descends and courses 
