WIDELY DISPERSED. 215 



that it proceeds as high up as Bodoe, lat. 68°, on the 

 western coast of Norway, is certain, because Mr. Oxenden 

 Hammond met with it there.* I have my doubts, how- 

 ever, as to its breeding in the more northern parts of 

 Swedish and Russian Lapland, because I neither met with 

 it myself, nor does M. Malm make mention of it when 

 enumerating the birds found in the surrounding country 

 to the great Enare lake, lat. 69°. 



The geographical range of the Solitary Snipe is very 

 considerable, being found during the summer months not 

 only in Scandinavia, but in all the more northern and 

 eastern countries of Europe, and the western of Asia, as 

 far at least as the eastern tributaries of the river Obis, in 

 Siberia. But its limits are said to be more confined than 

 those of its congenei's, the Woodcock and the Common and 

 Jack Snipe, and it is also said to be less numerous than 

 either of those birds. It winters for the most part, I 

 believe, in Africa and Asia Minor. 



Sportsmen and others in Scania contend there are two 

 kinds of the Solitary Snipe, one smaller, and the other 

 larger, which they call Stor Dublett, i. e., great double 

 snipe, or Tredackare, i. e., three-decker. But Nilssou 

 says, that " unless the female of the ^S*. major be meant, 

 I am unacquainted with the latter bird." 



The Solitary Snipe is considerably larger than the 

 Common Snipe; its usual length being between eleven 

 and twelve inches, from tip to tip of wing nineteen 



* "This was on tlie 17tb August, 1851," so that gentleman wrote -to 

 me. " Our route lay across a bog, when the dogs hunted up a very great 

 number of Solitaiy Snipes. I had never before seen them alive. They lay 

 very close, and rose silently, flying a very short distance. The dog caught 

 one, which I stuffed. If we had had guns with us, we could have killed a 

 large number of these line bii'ds." The specimen in question was subse- 

 quently shown me by Mr. Hammond, and I can testify to its being, as he 

 said, ;i young Solitary 8nipc. 



