Although the Black-winged Stilts cannot be regarded as sea-birds, they prefer salt water, and occasionally appear on the actual coast, in company with several of its regular occupants. Salt lakes and ponds are, however, their favourite resorts, except during the breeding season, when they seek the vicinity of fresh or brackish water. These birds are eminently social in their habits, and usually live in small companies of from six to twelve individuals, only keeping apart in pairs during the period of incubation, and again assembling, but in large flocks, throughout the winter months. Insects of various kinds, principally flies, gnats, beetles, and larvæ, form their principal means of subsistence, and these they seize with equal address from the surface of the water, in the air, or from amidst the mud and slime. In Egypt this species breeds in April, and in May constructs a careless nest of coarse grass. Wilson tells us that a nearly-allied bird inhabiting America merely places a bed of dry grass upon the marshy ground to receive the eggs when first deposited, but afterwards constructs a regular nest of a variety of dry materials, which are heaped together till they frequently form a mass weighing two or three pounds. The eggs, which are generally four in number, resemble those of the Peewit in form and size, but have a far more delicate shell, of a brownish, olive, or greenish yellow, marked with grey and reddish brown spots of various shapes and sizes, which are most thickly strewn over the broad end. In Hungary the flesh of the Black-winged Stilt is eaten during the winter, but even at that season is not very palatable. * * * * *