304 The American Woodcock 



perience to be talked of for years afterward, and 

 a half-dozen brace of birds a present fit for the 

 highest in the land, yet comparatively few of 

 them know much about the cock, except during 

 the open season. 



I gravely suspect that there has been more 

 nonsense written about the life, food, and habits 

 of this bird than about any other American 

 game, not even excepting the Carolina rail, 

 or sora, Porza^ia Carolina. Had I chanced 

 to have kept a record of all questions concern- 

 ing feathered game, probably one-half of them 

 would have been about the woodcock, for to 

 most men he is indeed a bird of mystery. 

 Those who have followed him only to his sum- 

 mer haunts might even question his right to a 

 place among upland game. To them he is 

 a bird of wet woodlands, of the rich mud of 

 creek beds and borders, of the swale and the 

 morass. Those who have sweated through 

 blazing summer days, have floundered amid 

 the black, boggy tenacity of the lowlands, have 

 fought brush and mosquitoes and breathed 

 miasmatic vapors throughout the long agony 

 of a July or August campaign, know little of 

 the real pleasure of cock-shooting. 



During the heated term, the bird of mystery 

 certainly haunts just such places, and those 

 who must hunt will find him therein. They 



