This richly coloured and pretty sandpiper with a strange name is one of two species in this order of birds of which the eggs are not known to ornithologists, or do not exist in collections. It is a regular visitor to the British coasts on migration in August, but many birds remain in this country until the following May. In some seasons they are very abundant, especially on the north-east coast of England; and in former times they were esteemed a great delicacy, and were netted in large numbers, to be fattened, like dotterels and ruffs and reeves, on bread-and-milk for the table. According to Camden (‘Britannia,’ 1607), the bird was named after King Canute on account of his excessive fondness for its flesh. Drayton, adopting this explanation of the name, wrote in his ‘Polyolbion’: The _Knot_ that called was _Canutus_ Bird of old, Of that great King of _Danes_, his name that still doth hold, His apetite to please, that farre and neare was sought, For him (as some have sayd) from Denmark, hither brought. It is possible that the Danish king introduced the taste for the knot, which lasted down to the end of the seventeenth century. As long ago as 1820 the knot was found breeding in the Melville Islands (lat. 80°), and later, at various times, in other arctic localities, but in no case were the eggs preserved. During the pairing-time the birds toy with each other in the air, the male uttering a sweet, fluting whistle. On our coasts they are very gregarious, feeding on the extensive mud-flats in large flocks. It has been observed that the young birds that come in advance of the adults in August are strangely tame in disposition. In May, when the return migration to their arctic breeding-grounds takes place, the birds that arrive on our shores from the south have their rich nuptial colours fully developed. Ruff and Reeve. Machetes pugnax. [Illustration: FIG. 104.--RUFF AND REEVE. ⅐ natural size.] The male in spring dress has the face covered with yellowish caruncles; a tuft of long feathers on each side of the head; throat furnished with a shield-like ruff of feathers; general plumage mottled with ash, black, brown, yellowish, and white, the ornamental feathers being differently coloured in almost every individual. In his winter plumage the male has the face feathered, and is without the ruff and ear-like tufts; under parts pale buff. Length, twelve inches. The female, or reeve, is a third smaller than the male, and in colour resembles the male in his winter dress. * * * * *