134 Mr. H. Seebohm on the Genus Scolopax. 
stead of sixteen tail-feathers *, and on an average a larger 
foot ; but it is doubtful whether the latter character would 
hold good in a large series. As it is, the difference is so 
small that, in order to make it as perceptible as possible, it 
is necessary to measure the foot in the longest possible way, 
that is, from the joint of the tibia and tarsus to the end of 
the claw of the middle toe. These dimensions vary in S. no- 
bilis from 3 - 0 to 3*3 inches, and in S. macrodactyla from 3*4 
to 3‘6 inches. So far as is known, the Madagascar Snipe is 
the only Snipe found on that island, and does not occur on 
the mainland. 
The explanation of the apparently extraordinary fact that 
two such very closely allied birds inhabit such widely distant 
localities appears to me to be as follows :—Their nearest rela¬ 
tive is unquestionably Latham's Snipe, which occupies a 
locality midway between them. The latter is a migratory 
bird, breeding in Japan and wintering in Australia; but 
there cannot be much doubt that it was once a resident in 
Japan, nor that a change in the habits of a bird from 
being a resident to being a migrant with a range of migra¬ 
tion covering a distance of five thousand miles soon pro¬ 
duced a corresponding change of structure. Its rounded 
wings and exceptionally long and heavy bill must seriously 
have impeded its progress, and we may confidently assume 
that Natural Selection soon lengthened the one to aid its 
powers of flight, and shortened the other so that it might 
have less weight to carry. What I wish to be inferred from this 
argument is the strong probability that Latham's Snipe—be¬ 
fore it became a migratory bird—differed scarcely, if at all, 
from the present condition of its allies in Madagascar and 
Colombia. The cold of the Glacial epoch not only forced it 
to winter in Australia, but so reduced the area of its breed¬ 
ing-grounds that large bodies were compelled to emigrate in 
search of fresh breeding-places, as Pallas’s Sand-Grouse did 
* Even this character appears to be doubtful, as Messrs. S. Roch andE. 
Newton (‘Ibis,’1863, p. 172) state that the normal number of tail-feathers 
of the Madagascar Snipe appeared to be sixteen. I have never seen an 
example in which there were more than fourteen. 
