SCOLOPACIM:. 169 



exposed openings which occasionally prevail ; many 

 of them are much esteemed for the table, and by the 

 sportsman. The plumage of all is coloured with 

 chaste and subdued tints, and is often remarkable 

 for the purity and distinctness of its markings. The 

 young run immediately on being hatched. Several 

 of the genera feed and perform their migrations by 

 night, these have the eye proportionally large, and 

 much developed. The bill is often furnished, at its 

 tip, with a structure of high sensibility, by which it 

 can discriminate by the sense of touch, the insects, 

 &c., with which it comes in contact. 



The first form we notice, is that of the Wood- 

 cocks or Snipes, which w r e shall here keep together, 

 though, by several intelligent ornithologists, they 

 have been separated, partly on account of the more 

 sylvan habits of the former, and partly from a 

 slight difference in the feathering of the tarsi, or in 

 the one set of birds being formed for a wading or 

 more aquatic life than the other. "Without doubt, 

 the three known species of Woodcocks, all sylvan in 

 their habits, could at once be separated by any one 

 from the Snipes ; but, at the same time, we have 

 one or two intermediate birds which could not, 

 assuming the distinctions we have stated as charac- 

 ters, be placed in either. 



GENUS SCOLOPAX, Linn. Generic characters. 

 Bill lengthened, straight, basally compressed, 

 slightly curved at the tip, and there dilated ; 

 the tip of the maxilla fitting into that of the 



