SCOLOPAX. 



487 



Plates. — Wilson, Am. Orn. pi. 47. fig. 1 ; Audubon, Birds Am. v. pi. 350. 

 Habits. — Baird, Brewer, & Ridgway, Water-Birds N. Amer. i. p. 188. 

 Eggs. — Described by Brewer on p. 192 of the above-mentioned volume. 



Literature. 



A comparison of a large series of skins of the North-American Snipe with a still Subspecific 

 larger series of examples of the Common Snipe presents some curious anomalies. The enaraoters - 

 extreme forms of the two species may be contrasted as follows : — 



Scolopax gallinago. 



Tail-feathers fourteen in number. 

 Axillaries white. 



Breast with obscure dark longitudinal 



streaks. 

 Bill varying from 30 to 2'5 inch in 



length. 

 Outer tail-feather crossed by three dark 



bars. diam. '4 in. 



Scolopax wilsoni. 



Tail-feathers sixteen in number. 

 Axillaries transversely barred with broad 



dark bands. 

 Breast with obscure dark transverse 



bars. 

 Bill varying from 2 - 7 to 2'3 inch in 



length. 

 Outer tail-feather crossed by five dark 



bars, diam. "3 in. 



So far as I know the American birds are always constant to their characters ; but, 

 unfortunately for the validity of the two species, there is not one of these characters (except 

 perhaps the very short bill, which is not always characteristic of the American form) which 

 does not frequently occur in examples from the Old World. Hume says that in India 

 Fan-tailed Snipes with sixteen tail-feathers are common enough. Snipes with barred 

 axillaries are perhaps the rule rather than the exception, even in England. Snipes with 

 transversely-barred breasts are occasionally found in the Old World, and the number of 

 bars across the outer tail-feathers of British-killed examples varies from three to five. 

 Nevertheless, 1 have never seen an Old-World example of a Snipe possessing all the 

 characters of the American species. 



The North-American Snipe is a summer visitor to the whole of the continent from the 

 Atlantic to the Pacific as far north as the Arctic Circle and as far south as the latitude of 

 New York. It winters in Mexico, Central America, the West Indies, and the extreme 

 northern portion of South America. A few remain to breed as far south as Maryland, and 

 a few remain to winter as far north as Texas. 



The constancy of the characters of the North-American Snipe has induced many 

 ornithologists of the New World to regard it as specifically distinct from our Common 

 Snipe. Ihe inconstancy of the characters of the latter form is, however, so great that this 

 conclusion can scarcely be maintained. The Common Snipes of the Palsearctic Region 



Geographi- 

 cal distribu- 

 tion. 



