406 BIRDS OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 



shot, it has been quietly sent into the larder with 

 other Snipes, and no notice taken of it, except per- 

 haps that it has been considered a remarkably fine 

 Snipe when it has made its appearance at table as 

 Montagu says, "a fine large Snipe." A good many 

 notices, however, of the occurrence of this bird in 

 various parts of England appear from time to time 

 in the ' Zoologist,' a work which has done so much 

 for the Ornithology of the country. 



The Great Snipe does not frequent quite such 

 moist and boggy situations as the Common Snipe, 

 and this may perhaps be accounted for by the 

 difference of food, as Yarrell says the food seems to 

 be entirely the larvae of Tipulae (" daddy long-legs ") 

 or congenerous flies : Meyer, on the other hand, 

 considers the food of both species to be much the 

 same, namely, worms and insects, and he adds that, 

 in many instances, caddis-worms with their curious 

 cases are found in the stomach, and also many grains 

 of sand ; but, contrary to the practice of others of 

 the tribe, this bird is said to cast these cases and 

 other indigestible substances in long pellets.* I do 

 not find that this peculiarity is noticed by Yarrell, 

 but he says, quoting Sir Humphrey Davy, that 

 " their stomach is the thinnest amongst birds of the 

 Scolopax tribe," and this may be some reason for 

 their rejecting these pellets when feeding on any 



* Meyer's British Birds,' vol. v., p. 46. 



