1 88 BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES 



There was another point of interest in this inte- 

 resting spectacle. The birds, when they were not 

 actually springing or flapping, mutually chased, or, 

 rather, followed and were followed by, each other. 

 But this, too, seemed to have become a mere form, 

 for I never saw either of them make the slightest 

 effort to dash at and seize the other, though they 

 were often quite at close quarters and never very 

 far apart. When almost touching, the foremost 

 bird would turn, upon which the other did also, as 

 a matter of course, but instead of running, walked 

 away in a formal manner, and with but slightly 

 quicker steps. The whole thing had a strange, 

 formal look about it. When this following or 

 dogging — chasing it cannot properly be called — 

 passed into the kind of combat which I have de- 

 scribed, it was always in the following manner. 

 The bird behind, having pressed a little upon the 

 one in front, instead of making a dash at him — as 

 would have seemed natural, but which I never once 

 saw — jumped straight into the air, flapping its wings, 

 and the other, turning at the same instant, did like- 

 wise, neither blow, if it could indeed be called one, 

 taking effect. The two thus fronted one another 

 again, and the springing and flapping, having re- 

 commenced, would continue for a longer or shorter 

 period. When these snipes leaped, their tails were 

 a little fanned, but not conspicuously so. Another 

 thing I noticed was, that the bird retreating often 

 had its tail cocked up perpendicularly, whereas this 

 was not the case with the one following. 



Both the two points that struck me in the fight- 

 ing of these snipes, viz. the apparent inability to 



