the Old World in habit ; but it is remarkable that the American birds can be easily distinguished by the rufous colouring of their axillary feathers a feature which is also
presented by the American Godwits (Limosa).
2. The Curlew of inlanders, or Stone-Curlew called also, by some writers, from its stronghold in this country, the Norfolk Plover, and most wrongly and absurdly the Thick-Knee or Thick-Kneed Bustard is usually classed among the Ckaradriidce, but it offers several remarkable differences from the more normal Plovers. It is the Charadrius cedicnemus of Linnaeus, the C. scolopax of Sam. Gottl. Gmelin, and the CEdicnemus crepitans of Temminck. With much the same cry as that of the Numenii, only uttered in a far sweeter tone, it is as fully entitled to the name of Curlew as the bird most commonly so called. In England it is almost solely a summer-visitor, though an example vill occasionally linger throughout a mild winter ; and is one of the few birds whose distribution is affected by geological formation, since it is nearly limited to the chalk-country the opea spaces of which it haunts, and its numbers have of late years, been sensibly diminished by their inclosure. The most barren spots in these dis tricts, even where but a superficial coating of light sand and a thin growth of turf scarcely hide the chalk below, supply its needs ; though at night (and it chiefly feeds by night) it resorts to moister and more fertile places. Its food consists of snails, coleopterous insects, and earth-worms, but larger prey, as a mouse or a frog, is not rejected. Without mak ing the slightest attempt at a nest, it lays its two eggs on a level spot, a bare fallow being often chosen. These are not very large, and in colour so closely resemble the sandy, flint-strewn surface that their detection except by a practised eye is difficult. The bird, too, trusts much to its own drab colouring to elude observation, and, on being disturbed, will frequently run for a considerable distance and then squat with outstretched neck so as to become almost invisible. In such a case it may be closely approached, and its large golden eye, if it do not pass for a tuft of yellow lichen, is perhaps the first thing that strikes the searcher. As autumn advances the Stone-Curlew gathers in large flocks, and then is as wary as its namesake. To wards October these take their departure, and their survivors return, often with wonderful constancy, to their beloved haunts (see BIRDS, vol. iii. p. 766). In size this species exceeds any other European plover, and looks even still larger than it is. The bill is short, blunt, and stout ; the head large, broad, and flat at the top. The wings and legs long the latter presenting the peculiarity of a singular enlargement of the upper part of the tarsus, whence the name CEdicnemus has been conferred. The toes are short and fleshy, and the hind-toe, as in most Charadriidce, is wanting. Tins Curlew seems to have been an especial favourite with Gilbert White, in whose classical writings mention of it is often made. Its range extends to North Africa and India. Five other species of CEdicnemus from Africa have also been described as distinct : whether there are so many may be doubted. Australia, however, possesses a very distinct species ((E. grallarius), and the genus has two members in the Neotropical Region ((E. bistriatus and (E. super ciliaris). The analogy of all these birds to the Bustards (Otididce) is manifest, but that they have any really close affinity to that family is questionable. An exaggerated form of CEdicnemus is found in JEsacus, of which two species have been described, one (jE. recurvirostris) from the Indian, and the other (JE, magnirostris) from the northern parts of the Australian Region.
(a. n.)
CURLING, a game in which the players throw large rounded stones upon a rink or channel of ice, towards a mark called the tee. Where the game originated is not precisely known ; but as it has been popular in North Britain for the last three centuries at least, and down till our own day been practised chiefly by natives of that country, it may correctly be spoken of as a Scottish .pastime. Some writers, looking to the name and technical terms of the game, trace its invention to the Low Countries : thus " curl " may have been derived from the German kurz weil, a game ; " tee " from the Teutonic tighcn, to point out ; " bonspiel," a district curling competition, from the Belgic bonne, a district, and spd, play ; though the supposi tion that " rink " is just a modification of the Saxon hrinTc t a strong man, seems scarcely tenable. Then, it is further stated that, as curling is called " kuting" in tome parts of Lanarkshire and Ayrshire, and very much resembles quoiting on the ice, the iianr.e may have some connection with the Dutch coete, a quoit; Lile Kilian in his Ttidcnic Dictionary represents the teim Ihiiyten to mean a pafct me in which large globes of stone are thrown upon ice like the quoit or discus. Possibly enough some of the Flemish merchants who settled in Scotland towards the close of the 16th century may have brought the game to the country. Unfortunately, however, for the theory that assigns to it a far-away origin, we find no early mention of it in the literature of the Continent ; while Camden, when describ ing the Orkney Islands in 1607, tells us that one of them supplies " plenty of excellent stones for the game called curling ; " and incidental references to it as a game plaj ed in Scotland are made by several authors during the first half of the same century. If the game be not indigenous to Scotland it certainly owes its development to that country, and in the course of time it has come to be nearly as much the national sport of the Caledonians as " the rough bur thistle " their heraldic emblem.
With very rude engines it was played at first, random whin boulders fashioned by the finger of nature alone, or misshapen granite blocks, bored through to let in the thumb of the player, having been the channel- stones used by the primitive curlers of the country. Even beferc Bannockburn was fought the ice of the Scottish lochs may have been employed as the arena of a bloodless strife ; though it is only as a piece of pardonable witticism that Ossian has been quoted as follows to show that curling was practised by his somewhat mythical heroes " Fly, son of Morven, fly ; amid the circle of stones Swaran, bends at the stone of might." In course of years the rough block of the game was superseded by asymmetrical object usually made of whinstone or granite, beautifully rounded, brilliantly polished, and supplied with a convenient handle ; so that the curling stone now used is as great an improvement on its remote predecessor as the Martini rifle is on the old matchlock which figured at Marston Moor and Culloden. It is circular in form, its weight from 35 to 50 Bb, its circum ference from 30 to 36 inches, and the height is about one- eighth of the girth. With engines of such shape and bulk, costing with handles from 2 to 2, 10s. per pair, all the societies, 472 in number, connected with the Royal Cale donian Curling Club play their spiels when " cauld cauld frosty weather " supplies the required arena. Most of these societies are located in the Land of Cakes and Curlers ; but many of them are transatlantic, no fewer than 37 belonging to the Ontario province branch alone ; while there are many hundreds of independent curling fraternities nortii of the Tweed, who play for their own hand, under arrangements of their own, though the rules and usages of the Caledonian Curling Club form a code which largely regulates " the roaring game," as Burns calls it, all over the world.
