The plumage is pale brown with darker streaks, the rump, tail, and axillaries being white, and the two latter barred with dark brown; the belly is white, the breast nearly so in winter. Found on our shores from autumn to spring, its wary habits are as well-known as its wild rippling note; the food consists of insects, worms, berries, and so forth; while four large pear-shaped olive-and-brown eggs are deposited in an ample depression formed on boggy or heathery ground. _N. cyanopus_, a distinct East Siberian form, met with in Australia and occasionally from New Guinea to Borneo in winter, has the rump-region brown and black. _N. tenuirostris_, of the Mediterranean and South Russia, resembles the Curlew, but is much smaller; _N. longirostris_ of temperate North America, migrating to Central America and the Antilles, has cinnamon axillaries–like all the New World members of the genus–and a dark rump. The remaining species, or Whimbrels, have a pale central streak down the crown, less distinct in _N. borealis_, the Eskimo Curlew, which has rufous axillaries barred with brown, and a rump like the back. This bird wanders to Britain, but breeds in the extreme north of America, and in winter reaches the south of that Continent. _N. phaeopus_, the typical {289}Whimbrel or May-bird, nests in the Shetlands and perhaps still in the Orkneys and North Ronay in the Hebrides; in summer it takes the place of the Curlew in the Färoes and Iceland, strays to Greenland, and occupies Northern Europe and Asia; while it visits the Azores, the whole of Africa, the Indian Region, and Australia in winter. Specimens from Eastern Asia, with more streaked rumps, have been separated as _N. variegatus_. In general plumage and habits the Whimbrel resembles the Curlew; it is, however, much smaller, the cry consists of sharper and more quickly repeated notes, and the parents, though anxious, are less shy at the nest. They often descend in a gyrating fashion, closing one wing. _N. hudsonicus_, of Arctic North America, which winters throughout South America, and has once occurred in Spain, resembles _N. borealis_ in its cinnamon axillaries, but is larger and less ruddy beneath. _N. tahitiensis_, common in the Pacific Islands, and probably breeding in Alaska, is recognisable by the bristly-pointed flank-feathers; _N. minutus_, ranging from East Siberia in summer to the Malay Islands and Australia in winter, has the back of the metatarsus as well as the front scutellated.