BAY-SNIPE SHOOTING. 193 



During the northward flight in May, there is often 

 good sport, but the time is more uncertain tlian in 

 Aup;ust ; nor do the birds, which are old and wary, 

 stool quite so well as on their return. In the spring 

 they pursue the same course as in the autumnal 

 flight ; which, although it is the most direct line, and 

 follows the principal expanse of salt meadow, ncces- 

 ssitates considerable journeys far out at sea. But it 

 is doubtless the fact that these birds, in consequence 

 of their stretch and power of wing, could sustain an 

 unbroken flight from north to south, and accomplish 

 the distance in a w'onderfully short space of time. 

 Unabated speed of one hundred miles an hour is 

 equivalent to twenty-four hundred miles in a day, 

 and portions of the flock may not pause between 

 Labrador and the swamps of Florida. 



When the wind is strong and continuo-us from the 

 westward, it is supposed that they pass far out to 

 sea ; and during these seasons there will be no flight 

 of birds either at Long Island or on the Jersey coast. 

 At such periods sportsmen often conclude that the 

 entire I'ace has been destroyed, till the easterly winds 

 and soaking rains of the following year, bring them 

 back more numerous than ever. As they must 

 migrate, and are not to be found anywhere on the 

 land, it is clear that they must have the power of 

 corapleLing their journey in one unbroken flight. 



The principal varieties are the sickle-bill, jack-cur- 

 lew, the marlin and ring-tailed marlin, the willet, the 

 black-breast or bull-head, and golden plovers, the 

 yelper, yellow-legs, robin-snipe, dowitchers, brant- 



