GALLINAGO SCOLOPACINA. 825 



flushed, it generally flies off uttering the well-known sca-a-pe or piping cry peculiar to its genus, and almost 

 invariably proceeds against the wind. When wild, it mounts in the air, and, if it has been walked up " down- 

 wind," after getting out of shot turns round against wind and flies off with a tumbling flight, proceeding from 

 side to side in its course ; and well up in the ah-, seen against a cold grey English sky, it looks twice the size it 

 does when rising out of the grass. 



When observed in northern regions during the time of its nidification its habits are very interesting, and 

 the life of concealment which it leads with us during the winter is changed for one of animation and excite- 

 ment. Its habit of " drumming " or making a humming noise while flying over its nest has been the subject 

 of much discussion and difference of opinion; and I will refer to the matter in the "Nidification" of the species. 

 Messrs. Seebohm and Harvie Brown have published some interesting notes on the species as observed by them 

 on the Petchora river, Northern Russia, which I here transcribe : — " We were not a little surprised when we 

 first became acquainted with the arboreal habits of the Snipe at Habariki, and saw one of these birds perched, 

 70 feet from the ground, on the topmost upright twig of a bare larch, where, one would have thought, it could 

 scarcely find sufficient foothold. With its head lower than its body and tail, it sat there, uttering at intervals the 

 curious double ' clucking ' note, tjick-tjuck, Ijick-tjuck, whilst others of the same species were ' drumming ' high 

 in the air over the marsh. To put all beyond doubt, Harvie Brown shot one in this peculiar position. Nor is 

 the Common Snipe the only bird which, not practising the habit with us, we found perching freely in Northern 

 Russia : the Snow-Bunting and Pipits have already been instanced ; and we may also mention the Common 



Gull, as will be seen under the notice of that species further on There can be little doubt, we imagine, 



that this habit was induced, iu the first instance, by the flooding of great tracts of country by the annual over- 

 flow of the rivers in spring, just at the time of the passage of the migratory flights, and, further, that what 

 was originally forced upon them has become, by use, a favourite habit." 



In India the great resorts of the Common Snipe are the paddy- or rice-fields in the cultivated districts 

 of the empire ; and here very large bags are made by good shots. Jcrdon speaks of 100 couples being killed 

 to one gun in the south of India even ; but among these no doubt was a large proportion of the last species. 

 Although the popular idea obtains that Snipe only feed on "suction," i. e. on the liquid, impregnated with 

 minute larva;, which is obtained by boring in the mud with their long bills, a much greater quantity of animal 

 matter is consumed by them than these advocates of the suction-theory imagine. Good-sized aquatic insects, 

 particularly of the beetle order, and occasionally tolerably large worms, may be found in their stomachs ; and 

 it is pretty certain that a Snipe will never refuse to swallow any worms that it meets with. 



Col. Irby, in his ' Birds of Gibraltar/ mentions that the best ground for Snipe in Morocco and Andalucia 

 is "where sedges and rushes had been burnt during the summer;" but, there being no cover in such places, 

 it was " useless to try and walk up to the birds, and the only way was to stand or sit perfectly still in the 

 most favourite spot and await their return." 



In Egypt their favourite haunts, according to Captain Shelley, are the large marshes in the delta of the 

 Nile, in which he has killed more than forty couple in a day. Von Heuglin remarks that in February and 

 March a good shot can, under favourable circumstances, kill from sixty to eighty head a day in the same district. 



Very large bags were formerly made on the Irish bogs, rivalling, in fact, those of Indian sportsmen ; but 

 now-a-days, since drainage has made such alterations, Snipe-shooting is not what it used to be, and twenty 

 couple would be considered a very good bag. I am informed that a gentleman last year killed thirty-seven 

 couple on Sir Arthur Guiness's estate in Galway ; and an account has been given to me, on good authority, 

 of the late Mr. John Dennis, master of a celebrated pack of Galway hounds, having made a wager that he 

 would shoot fifty couple, which feat he more than accomplished by killing forty before 11 o'clock, and finishing 

 with a total of eighty-four couple before night. This was more than forty years ago. 



Nidification.— -This Snipe's eggs have not, to my knowledge, been taken in India ; but there is reason to 

 believe that it may possibly breed occasionally in Cashmii 1 , as it does so on the other side of the range in 

 Kashgar. Mr. W. Brooks, writing to Mr. Hume, has the following remark on its summer occurrence iu 

 Cashmir : — " I saw a Common Snipe soaring away above when I took the Mallard's nest (near one of the 

 Cashmir lakes) ; and as it was making its breeding, bleating, and drumming noise, doubtless its mate was 

 sitting on its nest below, though I failed to find it." Dr. Scully found it breeding at Yarkand in May and 



