COMMON SNIPE. 129 
204. GREAT SNIPE—(Scolopar major). 
Solitary Snipe, Double Snipe—Often taken, no doubt, by 
many a sportsman in former days to be a very large specimen of 
the Common Snipe, than which no bird with which I am well 
acquainted seems to vary more in size. On the wing it does not 
look much larger than the Common Snipe, and is seldom seen 
except alone, or at most two in company. It breeds in high 
northern localities, and never with us, and no notice, therefore, 
of its nesting habits is permissible in this place. 
905. COMMON SNIPE—(Scolopaz gallinago). 
Whole Snipe, Snite, Heather-bleater.—Although this Snipe, 
like the Woodcock, retires to northern latitudes to breed, yet 
there are few districts in Britain suitable to its habits in which 
it is not known to breed in greater or less numbers. And it is a 
bird, moreover, which is quite sure to make it very distinctly 
known that it has a nest and eggs somewhere near, if only any 2 
human visitor appears on the scene. I refer to the very peculiar 
note or sound emitted by the male, always while he is on the 
wing high in the air, and always accompanied with a very remark- 
able action of his wings and curving descent in his flight. This 
sound or note—for it is not absolutely certain, I think, how it is 
produced—is variously called humming, bleating, drumming, 
buzzing. To me, the first time I heard it, and before I knew to 
what origin to assign it, the impression produced was precisely 
that of a large Bee, entangled in some particular place and unable 
to extricate itself; and I remember spending some minutes in 
trying to discover the supposed insect. The eggs are usually 
four, placed in a very slight and inartificial nest on the ground 
near some tuft of rushes or other water-herbage, They are of a 
greenish-olive hue, blotched and spotted with two or three shades 
af brown, the deepest being very dark. The old ones are said to 
K 
