or little-known Limicolse. 
255 
of eggs is also the same (four), which differ only in having the 
ground-colour dull olive, those of the Stilt being of a yellowish- 
clay colour blotched with black.” The food of the American 
Avocet consists chiefly of insects and small Crustacea. The 
stomachs of several specimens examined by Swainson con¬ 
tained fragments of the latter mixed with gravel. Like the 
various species of Totanus, it is a very noisy bird; and, utter¬ 
ing cries of distress, it flies towards any one who may invade 
its haunts. The females have the colour of the head and neck 
in summer much paler than the males, and approaching to a 
buff orange, while the scapulars are browner. In winter the 
head and neck in both sexes are white; in the adult, in autumn, 
and in birds of the year, the same parts are grey or greyish 
white. There can, I think, be little doubt that R. occiden¬ 
talis, Vigors, was founded upon examples of the present 
species, procured at San Francisco, in the latter plumage. 
Prof. Spencer Baird and Dr. Elliott Cones are certainly of 
this opinion*, although their views were not shared by the 
late Mr. Cassin. Vigors's original description in the f Zoolo¬ 
gical Journal' runs as follows :— ec Recurv. dorso, corpore in¬ 
fra, remigumque secundariarum apicibus albis; capite, collo 
supra, caudaque pallidissime griseis; remigibus nigris. Ros¬ 
trum pedesque nigri. Longitudo corporis 18, rostri 4, alee a 
carpo ad remigem primam 7\, caudse 3J, tarsi 4.” 
In the f Zoology of the Voyage of the f Blossom," pub¬ 
lished ten years later, the same naturalist again described the 
bird, adding the remark that it differs from our European 
species .... in the absence of the black markings on the 
head and nape; and from the Indian species, R. orientaliSj 
by the greyish colouring of the head and upper part of the 
neck, as well as by the fascia on the wings, and the black 
colour of its legs ”f. 
* See also Peale, Expl. Exped. 1. c. 
t The colour of the legs, erroneously stated to be black, must have 
been so described from dry skins. The delicate pale bluish grey of those 
parts fades very rapidly after death. In two specimens of R. avocetta 
which I skinned on the 13th April last, this beautiful colour had changed 
to black before the end of the month. 
t 2 
