RED-BREASTED SNIPE. 
57 
ii. ijfciSi 
genus, a group whose scientific characters were first laid down by 
our friend Mr. Say, though he referred the species to Limosa. 
In its winter plumage the Red-breasted Snipe instead of the 
mottled garb in which it is familiar, is of an uniform dusky- 
cinereous : the specimen lying before us is eleven and a half 
inches long and nineteen in extent. The bill is two and a quarter 
inches long, of a dull greenish, the tip is black, and obtains 
the strongly marked dorsal groove that so well distinguishes a 
Scolopax from the allied genera. The prevailing dusky-cinereous 
colour extends over the head, neck and wing-coverts, the back 
and scapulars being of a lighter dusky-cinereous, and each feather 
darker on its margin and tip: a broad line from the upper man¬ 
dible passing over the eye, and the lower orbit, are white: between 
the eye and bill is a dusky line; the irides are brown: the cheeks, 
throat and upper portion of the breast are pale cinereous, each 
feather being margined with whitish: the lower part of the back, 
the rump and upper tail-feathers are white, beautifully and closely 
fasciated with black: the breast, belly and thighs are white, 
the sides being spotted and waved with blackish: the lower 
tail-coverts are white with short black bands, narrower than those 
of the upper parts. The wings are six inches long: the lesser 
wing-coverts of the colour of the body, but they are margined 
with whitish; the middle and greater wing-coverts are darker 
with pure white margins and a little white along the shafts : the 
primaries are plain blackish-dusky, the inner one slightly edged 
with white: the secondaries are broadly margined and narrowly 
shafted with white : the first quill is longest, the shaft white : the 
under wing-coverts and long axillary feathers are white, fasciated 
with black. The tail is two and a half inches long, composed of 
twelve feathers, all full and rounded, the two middle a little 
longer, and marked like the coverts already described, that is 
white and densely fasciated with black bands. The feet are of a 
VOL. iy.—p 
