_Gallinago Wilsoni._
_Scolopax gallinago_, +Wils.+—Aud. pl. 243.
_Gallinago Wilsoni_, +Bonap.+
[110] Length 10³⁄₄ inches, expanse 17, flexure 5¹⁄₄, tail 2¹⁄₈,
rictus 2⁵⁄₁₀, tarsus 1⁴⁄₁₀, middle toe 1⁵⁄₁₀.
From November to April this beautiful and delicious bird is rather
common in the morasses of Jamaica. In the fetid swamp that borders
Bluefields Creek, I have principally met with it, running on the boggy
places, some of which are dangerous and difficult of approach. When the
tide comes in, however, the wading birds are driven to the edges of the
morass, and may then be seen from the high road at Belmont, walking and
feeding deliberately in the shallow water, among the slender stems of
the black mangroves, not half a stone’s cast from the passers by. When
the water stands just above the tarsal joint, the beak can just reach
the bottom: and thus it walks deliberately about, momentarily feeling
the mud with the sensitive beak-tip, striking with short perpendicular
strokes. Now and then we perceive the motion of swallowing. So absorbed
is the bird in its occupation, that I have shouted aloud, without its
taking any notice; nor when its eye at last caught the motion of my
hand, did it more than run, somewhat leisurely, away.
The present season (1846–7,) seems to be more than usually favourable
to the influx of the migrant _Grallæ_ from the north. Mr. Hill
mentions, in a recent letter, that a friend, R. Wilkie, Esq., bagged
twenty-two brace of Snipe in one day’s shooting, in October.
* * * * *
Other _Scolopacidæ_ that have been observed in Jamaica are the Knit
(_Tringa Canutus_), the Sanderling (_Calidris Arenaria_), the Willet
(_Catoptrophorus semipalmatus_), and the Little Woodcock (_Rusticola
minor_). These I have not seen, but the first three, Mr. Hill writes
me, are plentiful there, this winter. A second species of Woodcock,
also, has been reported to have been met with in the island.
+Fam.+—RALLIDÆ. (_The Rails._)