154 SNIPES, SANDPIPERS, ETC. 



place from which he arose, and the peent is at once resumed as a pre- 

 liminary to another round in the sky. 



The EuKOPEAir Woodcock {227. Scolopax rusHcola) bears a general re- 

 semblance lo our Woodcock, but is much larger; the under parts are barred 

 ■with black, the wings are barred with rufous, and the outer primaries are not 

 emarginate. It is of accidental occurrence in eastern North America. 



230. GallinagO delicata ( Orel). Wilson's Snipe ; English Snipe. 

 Ad. — Upper parts black, barred, bordered, and mottled with ditferent shades 

 of cream-buff; wings fuscous ; outer edge of outer primary and tips of greater 

 coverts white; throat white; neck and breast oohraceous-buff, indistinctly 

 streaked with blackish ; belly white, sides barred with black ; under tail- 

 oovcrts buft'y, barred with black ; outer tail-feathers barred with black and 

 white, inner ones black, barred with rufous at their ends and tipped with 

 whitish. L., 11-25; W., 5-00 ; Tar., 1-20 ; B., 2-50. 



Range. — North America, breeding from southern Minnesota, northern Illi- 

 nois, northwestern Pennsylvania, and Connecticut northward to Hudson Bay 

 and Labrador, and wintering from southern Illinois and South Carolina to 

 northern South America. 



W ashington, common T. V., Meh. to May 5; fall; occasional in winter. 

 Long Island, common T. V., Mch. and Apl. ; Aug. to Oct. Sing Sing, tol- 

 erably common T. V., Mch. 20 to May 6 ; Oct. 6 to Nov. 20. Cambridge, com- 

 mon T. v., Apl. 5 to May 5 ; Sept. and Oct. 



Eggs, three to four, olive, clay-color, or brownish ashy, heavily marked 

 with chocolate, principally at the larger end, 1-60 x 1-17. 



Wilson's Snipe frequents fresh-water meadows and swamps, and 

 in spring is often found in low-lying swales in meadows or mowing 

 fields, but, excepting in very dry seasons, it seldom alights on salt 

 marshes. At times, especially in winter or early spring, when the 

 meadows are covered with snow or ice, it resorts to springy runs 

 wooded with alders, birches, and maples, but as a rule it prefers open 

 places. Two things are essential to its requirements — ground so 

 thoroughly water-soaked as to afford slight resistance to its long and 

 highly sensitive bill when probing, and such concealment as tussocks, 

 hillocks, or long grass afford, for, unlike the Sandpipers, the Snipe 

 rarely ventures out on bare mud flats, save under cover of darkness. 

 Although less strictly nocturnal than the Woodcock, it feeds and mi- 

 grates chiefly by night or in " thick " weather. Its migratory move- 

 ments are notoriously erratic, and meadows which one day are alive 

 with birds may be quite deserted the next, or the reverse. 



Dear to our sportsmen is Wilson's Snipe, partly because of the ex- 

 cellence of its flesh, but chiefly from the fact that it furnishes a mark 

 which taxes their skill to the utmost, and which no mere novice need 

 hope to hit, unless by accident ; for the bird's flight is swift and tortu- 

 ous, and it springs from the grass as if thrown by a catapult, uttering 



