RANGE AND MIGRATIONS. 
25 
tive assurance that they know nothing at all about the birds, 
nor can they obtain from those around them any items of 
interest upon the subject. None of the books that have fall¬ 
en under our notice give any detailed account of the migra¬ 
tory shore birds that visit the continent. From some books 
of travel, special papers read before certain societies, inci¬ 
dental remarks here and there, and from our own corres¬ 
pondents, we have been able to glean such information as to 
warrant the belief that these birds not only reach the conti¬ 
nent in immense numbers, but that they cross the equator 
and pass as far south as Patagonia or Terra del Fuego. This 
theory is, however, pretty conjectural and liable to great 
modification by further investigations. The evidence to sus¬ 
tain it is not as ample a3 that we had the satisfaction of pre¬ 
senting in support of the theory that the breeding-grounds of 
these birds embrace even polar regions, but by grouping and 
cementing the few scattered links we trust the chain is strong 
enough to sustain at least a portion of its own weight. 
We know, then, very well that these birds en masse do 
leave the West India Islands in September and October. But 
where do they go ? Not northward, certainly, at this season 
of the year. We have, however, the most reliable testimony 
that they are very abundant in Guiana about the same time 
of their departure from the Antilles. Our friend Capt. B., 
who is an intelligent gentleman as well as an enthusiastic 
sportsman, was at Demerara with his ship about the end of 
September, 1877. While lying there his friends invited him 
to participate in a plover shooting excursion. In fact, he 
had several days of the grandest sport in this line he has even 
witnessed. Another voyage was made the next year to the 
same place, but he arrived six weeks later expecting to enjoy 
a repetition of the previous year’s sport. He went to his 
friend and asked him if he could get a few days’ shooting 
while his ship was taking in cargo. Mark the reply. 
“Why, Captain, you are too late! Had you been here a 
month earlier you would have had splendid shooting, a3 
there was an extraordinary ‘ flight ’ of birds, but now they 
are all gone 1” Further inquiry satisfied him that in Sep- 
