150 THE CONDOR Vol. XV the butt; but in some specimens they are much finer and irregular, at the same time sparsely sprinkled over the egg (no. 27). There are at hand two sets of eggs of four eggs each of the Whimbrel, and the markings in some of them are very heavy and large as compared with some of the others. OccaSionally, we find at the butt of one of these eggs, about a third of the distance from the end, a scraggly line of black, as though it had been done with a pen. This t)oint is interesting, as some o61ogists have claimed that this marking is of an adventitious nature. It ;?s also found in eggs of iV..amcri- canux, where a smaller mass of such scratchings may occur. Ridgway gives the size of ttle Whimbrel's egg as 2.39 by 1.66, and that is ahnost exactly the size of one in this Collection. Twenty-eight eggs of the Lapwing (Fanellux ,.anellux), or seven sets of four to the set, probably give a fair average for size, form and color of the eggs of this interesting plover, and this is the number of them before me at the present writing (fig. 46, nos. 48-5o ). It is a very handsome egg that Fanellus?lays, rang- ing in ground color from a very deep clay-buff, to a rich buffy olive, finely or very coarsely marked all over with blotches or spots of all possible sizes and shapes of blackish-brown. In size they average 1.75 by 1.3o. A rival of that of the Lapwing is the egg of the Golden Plover (Charadriux d. do?ninicux). Judging from the set of four at hand, it is always larger, more elongate, and much lighter in ground color. The blotches, dots, and specks dis.- tributed all over the surface of any one of them are of a blackish-brown, alm(Jst black. Sometimes the bigger markings .are congregated at the butt, but there is considerable variation in this matter. Average size 2.o 7 by ?.4o (Ridgway). Even handsomer than those of either the Lapxvin.g or the Golden Plc?ver are the eggs of the Killdeer Plover (Oxyechux voci[erus) (fig. 45, nos. 39-4?), for they are af the palest possible clay color, and the markings, of a character as shown in the figures, are black, causing them to be most striking o61ogical sub- jects. Size, ?.5o x ?.Io. , To represent the eggs of the species composing the genus ?tegialitis, those of the Snowy Plover (.4. nivosa) have been chosen (fig. 45? no. 44), and they are very modest-looking little affairs, the collection containing three sets of three eggs to the set, all of which I have duly compared. Whether this' is the usual clutch I am, at this ?vriting, unaLle to state, and Ridgway does not commit hint- self on this point in his "Manual,:' while Coues says not a word about the eggs of this species of plover in his "'Key" (5th ed. pp. 780, 78?). They exhibit but very little variation in any particular, all being of a very pale, dull, buff-clay col- or, finely spotted, nearly all over, though not thickly, with blackish-brown spots and the finest kind of scraggly hair-lines. In some, the dots are coarser, and no hair-lines appear on the specimens, the markings being chiefly congregated at the big end, though not altogether so. No. 44 presents one of these eggs, nearly natural size. The 'Wilson Plover (Ochthodromus wilsonius) (fig. 45, no. 43) also lays a very pale-colored, buffy tinted egg, more elongate than in the' last species, but very similarly marked with blackish-brown irregular spots as shown in the fig- ure. These are pretty evenly distributed all over the egg, and never of very larg? size. The eggs, then, shown in nos. 40-44 are the general style and pattern of the smaller species of plovers; but we note a decided difference when we come to ex- amine those of the Mountain Plover (Podasocys montanus) (fig. 45, no. 42). This egg is rounder, or rather less pyriform, than is usually the case among these.
