176 A Book of the Snipe. 



tion for companionship's sake. If a few 

 square yards of ground hold fifty birds, it is, 

 to quote a remark of John Bickerdyke's upon 

 the pike, "the surroundings and not the 

 society that have brought them together,'' 

 and it may be added, that cause them to 

 take for a time the same Hne of escape. 



How different is the case with birds natur- 

 ally gregarious — wild ducks or geese, for in- 

 stance. Nothing in nature is more astonish- 

 ing than the beautiful regularity of a large 

 flight of these splendid wildfowl. From the 

 absolute orderliness with which they change 

 places, wheel, or swoop, or soar together, 

 there seems to be a sort of telegraphic com- 

 munication between the leaders of the vast 

 flock and their following, the tail of which may 

 be many yards in rear. This drill is even 

 more admirable in those countless myriads of 

 birds so apparently unintellectual as starlings, 

 which sometimes darken the sky with their 

 manoeuvring battalions. Such a gift is obvi- 

 ously the provision of Nature for the preserva- 

 tion of order and cohesion in creatures she 



