Genus CALIDRIS.

Gen. Cuar. Beak mediocral, rounded, rather slender, flexible, above sulcated, its tip de-

pressed, smooth and dilated. _Nostrils linear, placed in a long groove. Feet four-toed ;

the toes margined and cleft; the hinder toe with its tip alone resting on the ground.

KNOT.

Calidris canutus, Brass. e¢ Cuv.

[ VA
Le Bécasseau canute.

Aurnouca the Knot does not make the British Islands a place of permanent residence in which to incubate
and rear its young, yet it is abundant on its passage both during its equinoctial and polar migration. While
on the latter journey, it visits our island in the month of May, at which time many individuals have almost
entirely gained the full plumage of summer, so much so, as to lead us to suppose that they would remain on
our shores to breed; a supposition which is strengthened by actual dissection ; still, however, we have no
undoubted facts upon which to assert that such a circumstance has occurred. Leaving our shores after a
short sojourn, they pass northwards to their arctic breeding-places : this duty accomplished, they commence
their migration southward, visiting our island again in their passage, when many remain the whole of the
winter, during which they live congregated in flocks on the borders of the sea, but giving the preference to
marshy and fenny countries m their native latitudes for the purpose of incubation. While they make this island
their asylum, numbers are annually taken, either in nets or by the gun, for the purposes of the table. In the
London markets they may be generally met with in the spring, and during the whole of the winter.

The Knot is not only common in the arctic regions of the Old World, but is equally so in the northern
portions of America, extending throughout the whole of the circle ; its southern migrations seldom exceeding
the latitudes of the Mediterranean,

We know of no birds in which the great difference between the stages of plumage in winter and summer
has led to so much confusion and the creation of so many synonyms: an examination of individuals in every
stage of plumage, from the greyish white of winter to the fine brownish red of summer, has clearly satisfied
us that they are specifically the same. Independently of the great dissimilarity of colour which the adult Knot
exhibits at these opposite seasons of the year, the young possess a colouring distinct from either, the ground
of which nearly resembles the plumage of winter, but every feather on the upper surface is edged at its tip
with two crescents, the outer one white and the inner one black, producing a most beautifully barred ap-
pearance: under surface buff colour. Concerning the nidification of the Knot we have been able to collect

no information whatever.

The two sexes are alike in colouring, or, if there be any difference, the female is the finest in colour and
the largest in size.

In summer, the whole of the upper surface is of a reddish brown, the top of the head and back of the
neck bemg marked with small longitudinal streaks of black, while each feather a the back and wings
has a central dash of the same colour branching out into irregular bars on the wings; quill-feathers and
tail blackish brown ; the whole of the under surface is of a brick red; bill green at the base, black at the
tip; legs greenish olive ; irides dark brown.

In winter the whole of the upper surface
breast and whole of the under surface white, flanks and side
and arrow-shaped marks of brown.

The Plate represents an adult bird in the summe

is of a fine ash grey; the quills and tail brownish black ; the
s of the chest being variegated with longitudinal

r and winter states of plumage of the natural size.