Favorable seasons for snipe, when heavy or repeated rains have saturated the meadows, and filled every hollow with stagnant pools of dirty water, are also favorable for mosquitoes. Persons who suffer from the bites of this pestiferous insect--and the difference between individuals upon this subject is remarkable--should prepare themselves with mosquito-nets and ill-scented oils, as they would for a visit to the wild woods; while those who are much affected by the sun should bring unguents with which to temper its intensity and assuage the pain that its burning rays inflict. Shoes are the proper things for the feet, as boots become heated and uncomfortable; and a brown linen jacket with white flannel pantaloons, thick enough to resist the attacks of a mosquito, and with the necessary underclothes for an exceptionally cold day, constitute the most practical rig. If the sportsman use a muzzle-loader--which he should not do if he can afford to buy a breech-loader--he must have a loading-stick which he can extemporize from his cleaning-rod by substituting a ramrod head for the jag. This he does by simply having a piece of brass of the proper size and shape to screw into the place of the latter. He should also have two guns, or he loses the chance at the returning flock, which is the most exciting, as it is often the most successful shot. The powder should be coarse; the large grain of the ducking-powder being alone fitted to withstand the deleterious effects of the moisture that is an invariable concomitant of the salt atmosphere of the ocean. One great difficulty that the writer has encountered in preparing this work, is a proper selection of names--the natural history of our country is popularly so little understood; to copy English names and apply them to creatures bearing a faint resemblance in general coloring, though neither in habits nor scientific distinctions, was so natural to the first immigrants, and the introduction of a proper appellation is so nearly impossible, that the confusion in nomenclature of our birds, beasts, and fishes is hardly surprising. This confusion existing in every department of natural history--confounding fish of all varieties, leaving birds nameless, or giving them too many names--culminates among the bay-snipe.