268 scolopachle. 



situated, or whether of fresh or salt water, being equally attractive 

 to the snipe, the nature of its food must be various, and not of 

 one kind, as Sir Humphrey Davy believed that of the double snipe 

 to be.* A sporting friend once found a full-grown horse-leech 

 in a snipe shot on the 20th of August ; a second instance of 

 which, in mild weather, has also been made known to me. - The 

 contents of the stomach of seven of these birds, winch I particu- 

 larly examined, and all from different localities, were as follows : — 

 of three shot in the month of January, two contained a few seeds, 

 and the third was half-filled with soft vegetable matter : — two shot 

 in March exhibited the remains of vegetable food which resembled 

 Conferva : — of two killed in October, one contained a large worm, 

 and two or three seeds of different kinds; the other, two insect larvse 

 (Ascaris-like in form) . Fragments of stone, of which some were the 

 size of small peas, were found in all, the last-noted one being filled 

 with them.t It is a common saying in Ireland, that snipes are 

 not good for the table until after the first frost of the season. 

 Sir Humphrey Davy remarks : they " are usually fattest in frosty 

 weather, which I believe is owing to tin's, that in such weather 

 they haunt only warm springs, where worms are abundant, and 

 they do not willingly quit these places, so that they have plenty 

 of nourishment and rest, both circumstances favourable to fat. 

 In wet open weather they are often obliged to make long nights, 

 and their food is more distributed" (p. 334, second edition). This 

 explanation is not, to my mind, satisfactory. 



Of the snipes' manner of feeding when actively engaged, it is 

 difficult to have ocular demonstration ; but during frost I have 

 frequently seen them at the edges of mill-races and oozy streams, 

 where they were stationary — and when backed by snow, even con- 

 spicuous — with more than a third of the bill immersed, the 



* ' Salmonia,' p. 22, second edit. — 



f The vegetable substances may have remained after worms and other soft animal 

 food had been dissolved. 



Sir H. Davy observes: — " In the stomach of the common snipe I have generally 

 found earth-worms, and often seeds and rice [the allusion is to the continent] and 

 gravel," p. 123. He again mentions its feeding upon "almost every kind of worm 

 or larva," p. 333. 



