412 THE BLACK-TAILED GODWIT. 
deep, picking small insects off the surface with their long bills; 
or again walking along the water’s edge on sands or mud banks, 
picking up small shells and shrimps. 
Selby says that this species may be “frequently seen wading 
tolerably deep in water, zmmersing the head at intervals and 
searching the deposit beneath,’ This may be a fact, but I can 
only say that I have often watched this species, and yet have 
never noticed that it zmersed the head. 
They are not birds that court concealment, They are often, 
when in ones or twos, difficult enough to get near, but they are 
usually easy enough to see, as they always, or almost always, 
keep out in the open, whether they be walking or wading, or 
asleep on one leg in water just up to their breasts, and their 
necks, heads, and long bills nestled into their backs. 
On land, where a large party is feeding, they alternately 
stalk about with much dignity, and make rapid and easy little 
runs, accompanied often by flutterings of the wings to pounce 
on some tid-bit. When thus occupied, and in force, they are 
at times ridiculously tame, and I have stood watching a flock 
for several minutes, on a low earthen ridge overlooking 
their feeding ground, and within thirty yards of the nearest birds, 
without their taking the smallest notice of me. Of course 
they are easy to shoot at such times, and in two shots, fired 
at such flocks, whilst I was at the Manchar Lake, twenty-two 
were procured at one time, and eighteen the other. This sounds 
like very unsportsmanlike butchery, but then they are one 
of the very best birds for the table with which India presents 
us. They are always nice ; even those that I have shot close 
to the sea were entirely free from any unpleasant flavour, while 
when really fat and in good condition, well fed on rice, they 
are, in my opinion, though very differently flavoured, quite 
equal to either Woodcock or Jack, and far superior to Fantail 
or even Common Snipe.* Of course they must be properly 
cooked, only plucked and cleaned the moment before they are 
put to the fire, only cooked just sufficiently and served up 
at once. I can’t help dwelling upon this because all game is, 
as arule, utterly spoilt in India by our native cooks. First 
they pluck and clean birds hours before they are wanted, the 
result being that, in the extremely dry atmosphere of Upper 
India, the flesh is half-dried up before the cooking commences. 
Then the bird, instead of being roasted lightly, is stuck in a 
cooking pot and steamed at leisure, at times, for hours, very 
often when cooked, taken off and allowed to cool, and always 
only taken out to brown for a few minutes, just before being 
* Our forefathers fullyappreciated this bird, which less than one hundred years ago 
bred plentifully in England, and Yarrell tells us that— 
‘*Thomas Muffet, that ever famous doctor in physick, as he is called in his title-page, 
says in Health’s Improvement, page 99. ‘but a fat Godwzt is so fine and light meat, 
that noblemen, yea and merchants too, by your leave, stick not to buy them at four 
nobles a dozen,’” 
