()12 SCOLOPACID.E. 



food it chooses sheltered situations among strong rushes, or 

 coarse long grass, and the luxuriant vegetation common to 

 moist grounds. In such places the Jack Snipe is remarkable 

 for its sluggishness, seldom taking wing till almost trodden 

 upon, which has induced French Naturalists to call this spe- 

 cies Bccassine sourde, as though it were deaf to the approach 

 of an enemy, and instances have occurred in which a Jack 

 Snipe has allowed itself to be picked up by hand before the 

 nose of a pointer. Though generally dispersed over the 

 British Islands in winter, it is considered to be less numerous 

 as a species than the Common Snipe, and does not, when 

 flushed, utter any note. The Jack Snipe appears to have 

 particular attachment to certain localities, so much so, that 

 a sportsman shooting for years in succession over the same 

 ground, knows exactly where to look for any Jack Snipe that 

 is in his country. Thus Mr. Selby, who is a good sportsman 

 as well as an accomplished naturalist, says of this species, in 

 reference to his own locality in Northumberland, " the first 

 flights generally arrive here as early as the second week of 

 September, as I have seldom failed to meet with it in a 

 favourite haunt between the 14th and 20th of that month,"''' 

 and I receive similar accounts from other country friends with 

 whose communications in ornithology I am favoured. 



This bird is to be seen in the London poulterers' shops as 

 late as the first week in April in every year, and the plumage 

 then exhibits all the bloom and brilliancy of the approaching 

 nuptial period, but I have never seen a bird that was killed 

 in summer, or a British example of the egg. ]Slr. Paget, in 

 his sketch of the Natural History of Yarmouth and its neigh- 

 bourhood, says, " Mr. C. Girdlestone offered a sovereign to 

 any one who would bring him a specimen of this bird shot in 

 summer. In 1822 he had one brought to him in June; 

 and in the same month, in 1824, he himself saw a pair on 

 Bradwell common : about two years after another specimen 



