606 



SCOLOPACID^:. 



scapulars and wing coverts brown, darker on the mantle and scapulars, the 

 feathers of which are broadly edged with yellow and spotted and streaked with 

 rusty ; the scapulars, tertials and wing coverts barred with the same ; lower 

 back, rump and upper tail coverts rufescent brown, barred with dusky ; under 

 wing lining and axillaries white, distinctly and richly barred with blackish 

 brown ; tail basally dark brown, followed by a large oval rufous or rufous buff 

 patch, and a narrow subterminal dark band, tipped pale rufous or the colour 

 of the oval patch ; primaries and their coverts, also the secondaries, pale brown 

 or dusky, narrowly margined at the tip with white, both webs unicolorous. 



Length. 975 to 10 inches ; wing 4-8 to 5-4 ; tail 2 to 2-5 ; tarsus ri2 to 

 1-25. Females are larger. Legs and feet plumbeous with a greenish tinge; 

 irides deep brown ; bill 2'2 to 2*6; gape and base of bill greenish ; rest of bill 

 pale horny, with a dusky tip for about one-third its terminal length. In the 

 females the bills average from 2*45 to 27. 



. Nearly throughout India, rare in the Punjab, N.-W. Provinces and 

 Sind, also in Rajputana, Kutch and Kattiawar; fairly common in N. Guzerat, 

 Central India and Khandeish. In Bombay, Concan generally, and theDeccan, 

 as well in the Nizam's Provinces, it is plentiful, also in Lower Bengal, east and 

 west of the Brahmapootra. It is recorded from Arracan, Pegu, Tenasserim, 

 the Andamans and Nicobars, where it is most commonly met with. This 

 snipe is a migrant ; arrives in Sind about the middle of August, and leaves 

 about the end of March or middle of April. Rice fields, mud swamps, and 

 the vicinity of large rivers, jheels and tanks, where there are sedges and rushes, 

 are the selected spots of the Pin-tail, at least in Sind. 



1285- GallinagO SCOlopacina, Bonap., Comp. list, B. Eur. and N. 

 Amer. p. 52; Jerd., B. Ind. iii. p. 674, No. 871 ; Hume, Nesls and Eggs 

 Ind. B. p. 586; flume and Dav Str. F. vi. p. 459 ; Legge, B. Ceylon, p. 820 ; 

 Murray, Vert. ZooL, Sind, p. 240. Scolopax gallinago, Linn., Syst. Nat. i, 

 p. 244. Scolopax ccelestis, FrenzL, Beschr. der Vogel und ihrer Eier in der 



