ASSAM, SYLHET AND CACHAR. 341 



Deputy Commissioner of Sibsagar, he had annually noticed 

 these birds frequenting the tank. Has such an occurrence 

 been noticed anywhere else in India ? In Hume and Mar- 

 shall's " Game Birds of India," page 81, Vol. Ill, Tickell is 

 reported to have said, " all along Tirhoot, Chupra, and the Terai 

 they appear to be unknown. " I am writing this at Bagaha on 

 the banks of the '' Gunduck " river, and from January to the 

 end of April 1888 their call used to be heard every day. Mr. 

 W. H. Blake, who is an old resident of the place, assures me 

 they are annually seen in numbers, and during the old days, 

 when there was no Kailway to Bettiah, he noticed and has shot 

 them while travelling by boat along the whole length of 

 the " Gunduck " to its junction with the Ganges near Dinapore. 

 In Assam the natives call them Bonooria Hans. " — J. K C. ] 



From near Sadiya, I received a specimen of 950. — Sarcidiornis 

 melanonotus, Penn., and Godwin-Austen also records this 

 species from Upper Assam, but I have as yet no other 

 record of its occurrence in Assam, Sylhet or Cachar. It pro- 

 bably does occur in Arakan, though I have been unable to verify 

 the fact. It is generally distributed in Pegu, and common 

 in most large swamps and lakes, but though Ramsay procured 

 it near Tonghoo, we never observed it in Tenasserim proper, 

 nor do we believe that it occurs there now, except perhaps as 

 a rare straggler. 



951.— Nettopus coromandelianus, Gm. 



Pretty common at the Logtak lake, and seen occasionally 

 over the south and east of the basin, amongst other places in 

 the Toyang at its junction with the Chakpee, and in a small 

 nullah east of Kokshin Koonoo, 



This species occurs all over Assam, Sylhet and Cachar. It is 

 found all over British Burmah, but is very scarce in Southern 

 Tenasserim. m i • 



[Though nowhere numerically abundant, the Cotton leal is 

 found inDibrugarh during the rains wherever there are j heels 

 amongst open cultivated country, going about in pairs and 

 retiring during the cold weather to large reedy swamps.— J . K. O.J 



952.— Dendrocygna javanica, Horsf. 



Seen occasionally all over the Manipur basin, but nowhere 

 in large numbers. There were two or three pairs m a 

 tank in the Residency grounds— wild birds that had been 



