COMMON SNIPE. 325 



of enormous flocks visiting us from temporary causes, and 

 we have fortunately a few records of the numbers killed 

 on such occasions ; but these are, of course, no guide as 

 to the bags then made in any average season. From 

 conversations I have had, however, with several old 

 sportsmen on this point, I believe that where forty or 

 fifty years ago, twenty, or five and twenty, couples 

 a day was reckoned good sport (occasionally as large 

 a number falling to one gun) at the present time, even 

 on the best ground, ten couples would be reckoned 

 a good bag and four or five an average quantity. At 

 Surlingham, Mr. Robert Pratt, who has had considerable 

 experience in such matters, assures me that although 

 during the last few years the broad and surrounding 

 marshes have been carefully preserved, they have 

 nothing like the amount of snipes in the autumn and 

 winter that they had fifteen or twenty years ago. This 

 he attributes to certain tidal influences caused by the 

 opening out of Yarmouth Bridge, by which the waters 

 rise and fall more rapidly than they used to do, 

 thus suddenly flooding out the snipes with an excep- 

 tionally high tide, and again receding too soon to leave 

 the marshes in a fit state for feeding. This also applies 

 more or less to other localities where, prior to the 

 drainage system of the present day, the very gradual 

 subsidence of the waters, after a wet season, left the 

 marshes in the most attractive condition for snipes; 

 whilst many of them have now become too dense and 

 mossy. In October, 1852, after repeated visits with but 

 small results, a good shot bagged eighteen couples in 

 one day on Surlingham broad, but since then the largest 

 bag I know of, on the same ground, has been twelve 

 and a half couples, and between five and six is con- 

 sidered fair shooting. In the season of 1862-3 over 

 four hundred snipes were killed to an average of three 

 guns, about Surlingham and Rockland ; and still more 



