THE SNIPE AND SNIPE-SHOOTING. 145 



mood for this that snipe are on the wing by day, 

 except when put up. When hovering, the snipe 

 poise themselves in the air at a considerable height, 

 and, suddenly dropping or darting away, make 

 this noise with their wings ; then they make another 

 hover, and then another dart. When in this humor, 

 the snipe will not lie to dogs nor to be walked up 

 within shot, and no sport is to be had. They 

 usually do it on still, cloudy days. I have seen 

 statements to the effect that at such times snipe 

 will alight on fences, stumps, and the topmost 

 boughs of trees. I can only say, touching these 

 statements, that my experience is all the other 

 way. I have been many years in a part of the 

 country where the snipe are found in amazing 

 abundance every spring and fall ; I have seen them 

 hovering hundreds of times, when hundreds of 

 them were at it in the air ; but I never saw one 

 alight on a tree or a fence or on anything but 

 the ground. I have, I think, been a close observer 

 of the habits of such game-birds as frequented 

 Illinois. My living depended on it, in some de- 

 gree. This thing, however, I never saw a snipe 

 do, and I feel quite certain that snipe in Illinois 

 never do it. I do not say that the authors of the 

 statements in question have made wilful misrepre- 



