December, with its frost and snow, its cold grey skies, and biting northern weather, always brings with it skeins of swans, geese, and wild-fowl. The heart of the fowler warms as he hears the clangour and wild cries of the birds afar up, for although he cannot see their forms, he easily determines the species. He hears the gaggle of geese, the trumpetings of wild swans, and the cry of the curlew as it hovers over the lights. Among the fowl that are driven down by stress of weather are wisps of snipe, and, although comparatively small, no game is dearer to the heart of the inland sportsman or shore-shooter. Four species of snipe are found in Britain, though one of these, the red-breasted or brown snipe, can only be looked upon as a rare straggler. The remaining three species are the common snipe, the great snipe, and the jack snipe. All snipe have a peculiar zig-zag flight, and this peculiarity renders them most difficult to kill. Bagging the first snipe constitutes an era in life of every sportsman, and is an event always remembered. Another characteristic of birds of this genus is the beauty and design of their plumage. The ground colour is streaked and pencilled in a remarkable manner with straw-coloured feathers, which enables the bird to conform in a marvellous manner to the bleached stalks of the aquatic herbage which constitutes its haunt. The arrangement is somewhat similar to that of the woodcock lying among its dead oak-leaves. The common snipe is one of our well-known marsh birds, although drainage and better farming have not only restricted its breeding haunts, but have caused it to be less numerous. Still it probably breeds in every county in England, and our resident birds are augmented in numbers by bands of immigrants which annually winter within our shores. These mostly come from Scandinavia, and soon after their arrival may be seen dispersing themselves over the marshes in search of food. At this time they are exceedingly wary, and the alarm-note of a single bird will put every one up from the marsh. The startled cry of the snipe resembles the syllables "scape, scape," which is often a literal translation of what takes place before the gunner. The bird feeds on plashy meadows, wet moors, by tarns and stream sides, and on mosses which margin the coast. And this being so it is one of the first to be affected by severe weather. If on elevated ground when the frost sets in it immediately betakes itself to the lowlands, and when supplies fail here it soon starves, becoming thin and skeleton-like. Under ordinary circumstances the bird is a ravenous feeder, lays on a thick layer of fat, and is certainly a delicacy. Soon after the turn of the year snipe show an inclination to pair, one of them circling high in the air, and flying round and round over their future nesting site. It is now that they produce a peculiar drumming noise, caused as some say by the rapid action of the wings when making a downward swoop;