head as it turns over
the gravel in search of creepers, which appear to me to form the
bulk of its food.

Sir George Mackenzie seems to think that these birds destroy
salmon spawn, and this opinion is prevalent in Scotland. If it is
correct, it would go far towards putting an end to my partiality
for them; but I rather think that they are unjustly accused, and
believe they are catching creepers when they are supposed to be
eating spawn. If this is the fact (and it is well worth
ascertaining) they are rendering an essential service to the
fisheries instead of injuring them, because these creepers (the
larvae of the stone-fly, bank-fly, and all the drakes) are
exceedingly destructive to spawning-beds, and as the Water Ouzel
feeds on them at all other times, and as they are more abundant in
the winter than at any other season, I think this is the more
probable supposition. Of course, if Sir George Mackenzie has shot
the bird, and speaks from his own knowledge, after dissecting it,
there can be no doubt of the fact that it destroys spawn; but if
he merely supposes so because the Water Ouzel feeds in the same
streams where the salmon are spawning, it is very probable he is
mistaken, for the reasons before mentioned. (May 29th, 1834).

* * * * *

SCOLOPAX, SABINES, SABINE'S-SNIPE.

Some years ago I killed what I am now persuaded was a Sabine's-
Snipe, but unfortunately it was not preserved, for hanging it up
in the larder with the other birds I had killed, I found to my
great mortification that the cook had stripped it of every feather
before I was aware, and before I had noted down the markings of
the plumage.

The dry weather of August, 1820, had driven a flock of the Golden
Plover from the moors to the banks of the river Wharfe, and on the
14th of that month I had been out with my gun, endeavouring to
shoot some of them. On my return I sprung this Snipe from a pond
near home, and killed it. When I picked it up, I was astonished to
find a Snipe with the plumage of a Woodcock, and showed it to a
friend of mine, who is a good practical ornithologist, but he was
as much puzzled as myself to give it a name; so not being able to
find a description of it in any books to which we had access, we
jumped to the conclusion that it was a hybrid between the Snipe
and the Woodcock, and called it a bastard Woodcock.

According to the recollection I have of it, it was as large as the
solitary Snipe, and the bill was a little long