AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 59 



Excellent Snipe-shooting was formerly often to be 

 obtained in the fen-lands below Peterborough, in 

 Whittlesea Wash, and elsewhere. I have enjoyed a 

 few days of capital sport there about the middle 

 of October, and I believe that even now a good many 

 Snipes may occasionally be found in that part of the 

 country at that time of the year, but early information 

 and an immediate start were essential to the making up 

 of a bag, as the shooting is, or was, open to the public, 

 and the birds, even if undisturbed, seldom remain 

 there in any quantity for more than a very few days, 



A late well-known friend of mine, who was at the 

 time to which the following story relates an M.P. 

 and an ardent supporter of his political party, told 

 me that he once received a message in London from 

 one of the professional gunners and pole-carriers at 

 Whittlesea informing him that the Wash was full of 

 Snipes, and urging him to go down thither without 

 delay. My friend could not leave town till the early 

 morning of the next day but one, and declared that 

 on reaching the Wash he found no Snipes at all, but 

 the ground dirty-white with fragments of the ' Globe ' 

 newspaper (in which he was violently attacked) that 

 had been used as wadding by the Snipe-shooters of 

 the day before. But the sudden movements of bodies 

 of Snipes, though no doubt governed by fixed laws, 

 and cogent reasons, depend upon causes more obscure 

 to us and probably quite as rational as those of con- 

 tending political parties, and in many, I might say 

 most, of the favourite winter haunts of this species 

 it is a common event to find a great abundance 

 one day, and on the next, although perhaps exactly 

 similar weather-readings may prevail, to find the 

 ground completely deserted. 



