The European bird is so closely related to, being regarded now as only subspecifically distinct from, our Wilson snipe that I shall not attempt to write its full life history. The two birds resemble each other so closely in all their habits that this would involve useless repetition of much that I have written about the American bird. The European snipe owes its place on our list to its occurrence, probably casually, in Greenland. There is a specimen in the British Museum that is supposed to have come from Canada, but its history is doubtful. The snipe that breeds in Iceland and the Faroe Islands has been separated, under the name _faeroeensis_, as subspecifically distinct from the bird breeding in Great Britain and in continental Europe. It seems quite likely that the Greenland records should be referred to this form. _Courtship._--Much study has been given to this subject by European observers and differences of opinion still exist as to how the curious winnowing sound or bleating is produced. While the normal time for hearing this is during the spring months, it has been heard in February, during the summer and even occasionally in the fall. Rev. Henry H. Slater (1898) writes: Opinions differ widely as to the means by which this curious sound is produced. Meves declared that the tail feathers were the instrument, and claimed to have produced it artificially by the snipe's tail feathers fastened to the end of a long stick and swung through the air. Others hold that the tremulous motion of the tense wing feathers is the agency; a third theory is that the sound is vocal. The reader is at liberty to take his choice. I incline to the last, from analogy. I have seen the great snipe go through exactly the same evolutions at the nest, including the tremulous wings on the descending movement, and in perfect silence; I have watched the wood, the green, the broad-billed sandpipers, the Kentish plover, Temmick's and the little stint, and the red-necked phalarope, go through the same movements also at the nest, but in these cases the noise which accompanied the descending stage of the performance was unmistakably vocal. Dr. Leonhard Stejneger (1885) was also much inclined to the vocal theory when he wrote: