604 THE BIRDS OF YORKSHIRE. 



The return migration of the winter visitants usually takes 

 place about the end of March and in April. 



Nidification commences in April ; I have found young 

 in June which were well on the wing in July. A clutch of 

 five eggs, reported by Mr. R. Fortune, in Ripon Park on ist 

 June 1890 (Nat. 1890, p. 210), must be considered as unusual. 



The late Canon Atkinson related (" Moorland Parish," 

 p. 325) an incident of a couple of Snipe coming regularly 

 two or three times a day for eight or nine days to feed on 

 bread soaked in milk provided as a meal for hungry birds, 

 and placed on the lawn of Danby parsonage. It is known to 

 most ornithologists that wading birds are at times in the 

 habit of perching, and as regards the Snipe there is evidence 

 of this habit from the fact that it has been captured in that 

 deadly instrument the " pole- trap/' I have also had ocular 

 proof of the same fact in Ryedale, in June 1883, when I saw 

 a Snipe fly on to the topmost twig of a dead ash tree and perch 

 there for a minute (Zool. 1884, p. 28). 



There is still considerable diversity of opinion as to the 

 method by which the humming or bleating sound is produced 

 by the Snipe when descending in its spiral flight ; some 

 observers say it is caused by both wings and tail, while others 

 assert that the wings alone are used. 



The late J. Carter of Masham stated that an instance of 

 maternal devotion in this species came under his notice in the 

 spring of 1880. A drain was being made through a field, in 

 which a Snipe had built, and would of course have destroyed the 

 nest, but the workmen made a circuit, enclosing the piece of 

 ground containing the nest, which formed a kind of bracket 

 to the edge of the drain, and the bird, notwithstanding the 

 presence of the men, continued its duties and hatched off 

 the eggs. 



The number of tail feathers in the Common Snipe does not 

 appear to be constant ; I have seen and examined specimens 

 which had, some fifteen, and some sixteen feathers. 



Of the so-called Sabine's Snipe, now generally admitted 

 to be merely a dark form of the common species, Thomas Allis's 

 Report, 1844, contains the following observation : 



