Comparatively speaking, the haunts frequented by Limicoline birds during summer, or the season of reproduction, are not, in the strict sense of the term, littoral ones. But few species breed on the actual coast—in our islands they are represented by such birds as the Oyster-catcher and the Ringed Plover; the vast majority rear their young in inland localities, on moors and downs, by the side of rivers, streams, and lakes, in swamps, and so on. As soon, however, as the duties of the year are over great numbers of species resort to the sea coasts, where, in all districts suited to their requirements, they form one of the most characteristic avine features. It is amongst birds of this order that the habit of migration is exceptionally pronounced, some species journeying every year many thousands of miles between their summer haunts, or breeding grounds, and their winter homes, or centres of dispersal. In the present group of birds the wings are generally long and pointed, a form best adapted for prolonged and rapid flight, whilst the legs are usually long—in some species, as, for instance, the Black-winged Stilt, exceptionally so—enabling the birds to wade through shallows and over soft mud and ooze. In some species the feet are semi-webbed, as in the Avocets, in others they are lobed, as in the Phalaropes. The bill varies to an astonishing degree amongst birds of this class, and seems specially modified to meet the varying methods by which food is obtained. Thus we have presented to us the decurved bill of the Curlew type, the recurved bill, characteristic amongst others of the Avocet or the Godwits, the nearly straight bill of such forms as the Oyster-catcher and the Phalarope, hard and chisel-like in the former, and finely pointed in the latter; then, again, the bill in many species is hard and horny, in others it is acutely sensitive, full of delicate nerves, as in the Snipes and many others. The bill of the typical Plovers differs strikingly from that of the Sandpipers and Snipes, inasmuch that it tapers from the base to the end of the nasal groove, then swells towards the tip. It is utterly impossible in a work like the present, which only attempts a slight sketch of marine bird-life on British coasts, to deal adequately with the astonishing amount of variation, even in this single organ of Limicoline birds. We will, therefore, now proceed to notice the most characteristic species found on the tideways of our islands, either as resident species, as passing migrants, or as winter visitors. It will, perhaps, be most convenient, as well as most interesting, to deal first with those species that are resident on our coasts, as being the most characteristic forms of this group of shore birds. OYSTER-CATCHER.