236 WOODCOCK. 



WOODCOCK. Scolopax rusticola La becasse. 



Although many sportsmen consider, that there are 

 two distinct kinds of woodcocks, and Latham describes 

 three, yet they are more to be considered as mere 

 varieties of this bird, than any species that can be 

 separately distinguished from it. 



The feather of the woodcock, which is so accept- 

 able to miniature painters, is that very small one, 

 under the outside quill of each wing : to be sure of 

 finding which, draw out the extreme feather of the 

 wing, and this little one will then appear conspicuous 

 from its sharp white point. 



To prove, that woodcocks, on having migrated into this country, 

 will repair to the same haunts for a succession of winters, I shall 

 mention a circumstance, not as having pilfered it from Mr. Bewick 

 or Mr. Daniel, but because it was related to me by Mr. Pleydell 

 himself, when I was at Whatcombe House, where the bird is now 

 preserved. In Clenston Wood (a covert belonging to the above 

 place, in Dorsetshire), a woodcock was taken alive, in one of the 

 rabbit nets, in the month of February, 1 798. Mr. Pleydell, after 

 having a piece of brass marked, and put round its left leg, allowed 

 the bird to be set at liberty; and, in the month of December fol- 

 lowing, he shot this woodcock, in the very same coppice where it 

 had been first caught by his gamekeeper. 



Although it is here wished to abstain from all anecdotes, that 

 may not be considered of some little use in the way of information, 

 yet, while on the subject of woodcocks, I shall take the liberty of 

 mentioning one circumstance, that occurred to myself on the 25th 

 of January, 1810. It was, soon after, very correctly stated in a 

 newspaper ; but, no wonder, considered by many as an absurd and 

 improbable assertion ; and for this reason I shall, in quoting the 

 paragraph here, add, that the circumstance took place in the pre- 

 sence of the Rev. W. Nourse and two other gentlemen. " A few 



