142 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XV. 



Mr. N. S. Mondy has shot and given me a magnificent male Anas zono- 

 rhyncha (The Eastern Spot-billed Duck). The bird was one of three 

 seen on the banks of the Brahmupootra River. Mr. Mondy believes he has 

 seen others of this species before. This is the first recorded occurrence of 

 the Eastern Spot-bill in really Indian limits. 



Mr. Rose shot at the end of last year a fine male Pink-footed Goose, Anser 

 brachyrhynchus. Messrs. Moore and Mondy saw two birds which, they think 

 "were of this species. The feet were of such a vivid pink as to attract 

 attention when the birds were still far out of shot. 



E. C. STUART BAKER. 



Dibrugarh, March 1903. 



No. XII— GAZELLE TAKING TO WATER. 



The following incident may have interest for other members who, like- 

 myself, do not usually associate Gazelles with water : — 



When riding on a camel early one bitterly cold morning, towards the end 

 of January this year, along the bank of a wide and deep canal in the Hissar 

 District, Punjab, I saw a Gazelle {Gazella hennetti) some little distance 

 ahead on the same bank feeding along the grassy edge of the canal. When 

 I came within some forty yards, it suddenly sprang into the water, and 

 swam rapidly up stream for some distance ; then landed on a shelving part of 

 the opposite bank; scrambled up the side ; stood a few moments on top to 

 look round ; shook the water off its flanks and then bolted off into a sandy 

 waste beyond. It was a full-grown buck. I think he must have previously 

 swam across the canal to feed on the short grass on the side I was moving. 

 On this side, like the opposite, the country was perfectly open, so that if he 

 disliked icy cold water, he could easily have avoided going into the canal 

 to escape my approach. But he appeared to me to enter the water without the 

 slightest hesitation, just as a Newfoundland dog would behave. A shikari 

 who was with me, told me afterwards that the Gazelle constantly cross and 

 re-cross the canal and its branches. In the part of the Hissar District I went 

 over during a few days' stay, I noticed the Gazelle were nearly always 

 seen not far from the canal and its irrigating channels, while what Antelope 

 I came across, were miles away from water. The Gazelle appeared to keep 

 near the gram fields ; and although these fields were protected all round by a 

 high fence of thorny branches, they managed every now and then to jump 

 over the fence, as on several occasions I saw them inside the fields. I was 

 informed that when the hot weather sets in, the Antelope collect together 

 and then keep near the canal and its water-courses. 



G. S. ROD ON, Major. 

 Dharwar, March 1903. 



No. XIII— THE CRESTED GREBE. 

 It would appear that the Crested Grebe {Podicepes cristalus) is not at all un- 

 common in North-Eastern Assam. Messrs. Moore and N. S. Mondy have seen 



