The Plovers, with their allied forms, the Sandpipers and Snipes, and between which no very pronounced distinction is known to exist, constitute a well-defined group of birds, perhaps on the one hand most closely allied to the Gulls, and on the other hand to the Bustards. There are more than two hundred species in this group, distributed over most parts of the world. The Limicolæ (under which term we include the Plovers, Sandpipers, and their allies) present considerable diversity in the colour of their plumage, and in a great many species this colour varies to an astonishing degree with the season. The most brilliant hues are assumed just prior to the breeding season; the winter plumage is much less conspicuous. To a great extent this colour is protective, the brighter plumage of summer in many species harmonising with the inland haunts the birds then frequent: the duller hues characteristic of winter assimilating with the barer ground—the sands and mud-flats. It is worthy of remark that the species which do not present this great diversity in their seasonable change of plumage—such as the Snipes and Woodcocks—confine themselves to haunts clothed with vegetation all the year round; or—as in the case of the Ringed Plovers—to bare sands and shingles. In their moulting the Limicolæ are most interesting. It is impossible to enter very fully into the details of this function in the present volume, nor is it necessary, for the purpose of this study of marine bird-life, to do so. A few of the most salient facts, however, may be mentioned. The young of all Limicoline birds are hatched covered with down, and are able to run soon after their breaking from the shell. They consequently spend little time in the nest, after they are hatched. This down varies considerably not only in the pattern of the colour, but in the colour itself. Some of these chicks, or young in down, are beautifully striped or spotted; others are sprinkled or dusted with darker or lighter tints than the general colour. In all, however, the colours are eminently protective ones, and harmonise so closely with the hues of surrounding objects that discovery is difficult; more especially so as the chicks possess the habit of crouching motionless to the ground when menaced by danger. The first plumage of the young bird in the present order, approaches more or less closely in colour that of the summer plumage of the adult. At the beginning of autumn, however, these bright colours begin to be changed for a dress which resembles the winter plumage of their parents. This is not effected, however, by a moult, but by a change in colour of the feathers, only the very worn and abraded ones being actually replaced. In the spring following, these immature birds moult into summer plumage, similar to that of the adults, although the wing coverts retain their hue, characteristic of summer or the breeding season, until the next autumn, when for the first time