SEMI-PALMATED SNIPE 



29 



Crows, JaySj weasels, foxes, minx and man himself, that these af« 

 fectionate tribes have most to dread. 



The Willet subsists chiefly on small shell fish, marine worms 

 and other aquatic insects ; in search of which it regularly resorts 

 to the muddy shores and flats at low water; its general rendezvous 

 being the marshes. 



This bird has a summer and also a winter dress, its colors 

 differing so much in these seasons as scarcely to appear to be the 

 same species. Our figure in the plate exhibits it in its spring and 

 summer plumage, which in a good specimen is as follows. 



Length fifteen inches, extent thirty inches ; upper parts dark 

 olive brown; the feathers streaked down the center and crossed 

 with waving lines of black; wing-coverts light olive ash; and the 

 whole upper parts sprinkled with touches of dull yellowish white; 

 primaries black, white at the root half; secondaries white, border- 

 ed with brown; rump dark brown; tail rounded, twelve feathers, 

 pale olive waved with bars of black ; tail coverts white barred with 

 olive; bill pale lead color, becoming black towards the tip; eye 

 very black; chin white; breast beautifully mottled with transverse 

 spots of olive on a cream ground; belly and vent white, the last 

 barred with olive; legs and feet pale lead color; toes half webbed. 



Towards the Fall, when these birds associate in large flocks, 

 they become of a pale dun color above, the plumage being shafted 

 with dark brown, and the tail white or nearly so. At this season 

 they are extremely fat, and esteemed excellent eating. Expe- 

 rienced gunners always select the lightest colored ones from a 

 flock, as being uniformly the fattest. 



The female of this species is generally larger than the male. 

 In the months of October and November they gradually disappear. 



VOL. VII. 



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