94. AMERICAN GAME. 
duction, but is rendered scarcer in thickly settled -dis- 
tricts, nigh to large towns, by incessant harrassing, which 
drives it to remoter and securer feeding-grounds. 
I do not mean by this, however, to assert that the abo- 
lition of spring snipe-shooting would not be an advan- 
tage—on the contrary, I am convinced that it would; 
although well assured that no such measure can be hoped 
at the hands of our legislators ; for, as the snipe ordina- 
rily lays four eggs, the destruction of each one of the 
breeders on their way northward, of course diminishes 
the stock of the coming season by five birds. 
So much for the times and places of the snipe’s migra- 
tions. Of his appearance or characteristics—so well is 
he known—it is almost useless to speak; it may, how- 
ever, be well to observe that although commonly termed 
the Eneuisu Sniex, our bird is a thorough native Ameri- 
can, differing from the bird of Europe in being about 
one inch smaller every way, and in having two more 
feathers, sixteen instead of fourteen, in the tail. In 
other minute, but still permanent, and therefore charac- 
teristic distinctions, it differs from the Asiatic and An- 
tarcti¢ snipes; although in their rapid, zigzag flight and 
shrill squeak when flushed; in their irregular soaring 
through the air in gloomy weather; in their perpendic- 
ular towering and plumb descent, their drumming with 
the wing-feathers, and bleating with the voice, during 
the breeding-season, all the species or varieties so closely 
resemble each other, that they are far more easily con- 
