622 RED-BREASTED SNIPE. 
of the Atlantic it is of rare occurrence in the South of Greenland. 
It breeds on the vast morasses round Hudson Bay, and about as far 
south as lat. 44° N., migrating along the east coast ; but west of 
the Mississippi valley a slightly larger form prevails, with somewhat 
longer bill and brighter coloration in summer, and for this American 
ornithologists have adopted the name scolopaceus. Both forms 
occur in winter in the Gulf States and among the West Indian 
Islands, while it is admitted that birds undistinguishable from those 
of the Atlantic race occur on the Barren grounds and in Alaska— 
the summer-quarters of the western form—as well as down the 
Pacific side of America. For the purposes of the present work we 
may unite the two under one heading, and say that the Red-breasted 
Snipe breeds throughout the Fur countries, migrating in winter as 
far south as Brazil on the east side and Chile on the west, while a 
few wanderers cross the Pacific to Japan and North-eastern Siberia. 
On Long Island, near New York—where the bird is known by the 
name of ‘ Dowitcher ”—it arrives towards the end of April, and 
within a month the most northern of its breeding-grounds have 
been reached. 
According to Messrs. Dall, MacFarlane, Nelson, and others, the 
4 eggs are laid in June in some slight hollow in a tussock near a 
lake or marsh-pool ; their colour is greenish-grey or brownish-olive, 
blotched with dark umber: measurements 1°75 by 1‘22 in. The 
young are on the wing by the end of July, and early in August the 
adults begin to lose their red breeding-plumage, while by September 
they have assumed their grey winter-garb, and have formed large 
flocks. Owing to its tameness this species affords no sport, and if 
disturbed merely utters a short weet on taking flight, soon settling 
down again by the side of the water, in which it seeks the small 
insects, worms and marine bivalves which constitute its food. 
The adult male in summer has the crown blackish, mottled with 
tawny-brown ; feathers of the mantle blackish, with fulvous edgings; 
shaft of the first quill pure white ; upper tail-coverts and tail barred 
with black on white and rufous ; under-parts ruddy-brown, with a few 
spots on the throat and breast ; axillaries and under wing-coverts 
white, barred or mottled with dull black ; bill dark olive ; legs and 
feet pale olive. Length of the male ro in. (bill 2:2), wing 5°5 in. 
The female is larger but alike in plumage. In winter the general 
plumage is grey, and, except for its size and length of bill, the bird 
then superficially resembles a Dunlin in the dress of that season. 
The young bird is much greyer than the adult, and only.the margins 
of the feathers of the mantle are rufous. 
