MU. 11. STEVEN80N ON THE COMMON SNIPE. 
491 
Gilbert White alludes to it in three dilFereiit lettei-s to Pennant;* 
but evidently not quite settled in his mind as to its true cause, 
though leaning to vocalism. In his first note, speaking of numbers 
of Snipe breeding in summer on moory ground near his parish, 
he adds : “ It is very amusing to see the cockbird on wing at that 
time and to hear his piping and humming notes.” Further on, 
ho says : “ In breeding time Snipe play over the moors, piping and 
humming. They always hum as they are descending. Is not 
their hum ventriloquoas, like that of the turkey ? Some suspect 
it is made by the tcinys ! ” But in the third letter I quote from, 
he writes to Pennant : “ When you say that in breeding time the 
cock Snipes make a bleating noi.se, and I a drumming (perhaps I 
should have rather said a humming), I suspect we mean the same 
thing. 1 lowever, when they are playing about on the wing, they 
certainly make a loud piping with their mouths [alluding no doubt 
to their ascending notej, but whether that bleating, or humming, 
is ventrilo(pious, or proceeds from the motion of their wing.s, 
I cannot say ; but this I know, that when this fioiso happens, the 
bird is always descending, and his wings are violently agitated.” 
Selby (‘British Birds,’ 1833) refers it very decidedly to the 
action of the wings ; “As the bird, when this sound is emitted, 
is observed to ilescend with great velocity, and with a trembling 
motion of the j)inions.” And adds: “Their flights are performed 
at intervals during the day, but more commonly towards evening.” 
iMr. Seebohm, one of our latest authorities on British ornithology, 
confesses himself puzzled as to its origin, though, ^rguing from 
analogy (“ a dangerous proceeding,” he admits, in ornithology), he 
is inclined to believe that it is produced by the vocjil organs, and 
is equivalent to the trill of the Stints and other Sandpipers. 
And he adds in favour of his argument : “ The Tret that it appears 
to begin the inshnit the bird begins to descend, inclines me to 
think that after allowance is made for the time it takes for sound 
to travel, it must really begin before the descent, whilst the bird is 
not moving very rapidly.” 
1 cannot help differing from this far-travelled naturalist, through 
ocular and binocular evidence, and Mr. J. E. Harting and 
other ornithologists have satisfied themselves that this sound is 
l)roduced with the mandibles closed. I can no more accept 
* Letters X., XVI., and XXXIX. 
