208 lla: 2 22 ee CONDOR © eae :, | a 
collecting and during those years gathered a sufficient number of the eggs of 
the Wilson Snipe to lead me to consider them as not extremely rare. So it was 
that when the eggs I have spoken of as having been given to Pemberton were 
collected, in 1894, there was little incentive to take them even after they had 
been discovered oa had it not been for a peculiar, to me at least, circumstance 
I should salen not have bothered with them. 
At that time I had an uncle living on a ranch to the eastward of San Ber- 
nardino, and a portion of this land was swampy. Knowing of my interest in 
birds he told me one day of a bird that he saw about dusk each evening sailing 
around high over the swamp, that according to him would mount several hun- 
dred feet in the air and then, partially closing its wings, would swoop almost 
straight downward to within a few feet of the earth, the dive being accompan- 
ied Ly a loud whirring noise that ended in a sharp report. At first I 
thought that instead of a bird he had seen a large bat the name of which I did 
not know, but which I had been told had a somewhat similar habit. But he 
insisted that it was a bird, and at last I proposed that we go to the swamp to- 
gether so that I might ascertain for myself just what it was that he had seen. 
The trip was made a few evenings later and I not only discovered that the bird 
was a Wilson Snipe but also by watching it discovered the eggs, and as I was 
not able to shoot the bird then, I took the eggs to furnish proof of what I 
then thought was something new in the habits of snipe. I subsequently ascer- 
tained that the habit was one that other observers already knew about and so 
thought no more of the eggs although I had already blown them and placed 
them in a cabinet. When I afterwards disposed of the greater portion of my 
egg collection I did not include that particular set for the reason that I had 
filled out no data blank, and in my hurry in packing the other eggs I did not 
care to take the time to look up my notes and thus obtain the necessary data. 
Since learning from Pemberton that the records showed no such southerly 
nesting, although I had noticed that Grinnell’s ‘‘List’’ of recent date was also 
lacking on that point, I have inquired of some of the old-time collectors of this 
locality, among them R. B. Herron, one of the oldest and most successful eol- 
lectors of this section and a man known to most of us at least by the many ref- 
erences made to him in Davie’s ‘‘Nests and Eggs of North America’’. He in- 
forms me that he never considered the eggs of the bird in question as being 
particularly rare in this section. Harry Lelande of Los Angeles also informed 
me that he always thought that the Wilson Snipe nested in the southern end 
of the state, for although he had never taken a set himself he had killed very 
young Hick that had undoubtedly been hatched in this section. 
I was somewhat surprised when I looked over Grinnell’s latest list to note 
that he ommitted any extreme southerly records, for I felt certain that he 
knew of the eggs having been taken in southern Calceraia but attributed the 
omission to an oversight. Since Pemberton has expressed so much surprise in 
the occurrence I have taken the trouble to look up my copies of ietters to Dr. 
Grinnell when he lived at Pasadena and found that at least on one occasion I 
had listed among the eggs that I would be willing to exchange with him a set — 
of the Wilson Snipe. I have exchanged several sets with other collectors, but 
have not taken the trouble to look up my records sufficiently to ascertain just 
who the eggs went to. In any event I still feel certain that there can be no — 
possibility of such records being any cause for astonishment, and am writing , 
_this not because I think it is a new record but’ because Mr. Pemberton, and 
