582 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. NN. 



9 pairs are attenuated ; these outer feathers, however, vary con 

 siderably in number, and it is not unusual to find as few as 6 pairs 

 only of these, the central feathers, 10 in number, never varying. 



It is a curious coincidence, also, that in the majority of cases in 

 which this small number of feathers is found, the birds seem 

 considerably larger than the average. My attention to this curious 

 combination, i. e., extraordinary size with so few tail feathers, was 

 first attracted by some letters to the Indian Field written by 

 Mr. W. Val Weston, under the nom-de-plume of " Silvertoun." On 

 the 29th October he wrote giving the measurement of one of these 

 snipes : " beak 2f, wing 5£, weight 5^ oz ; " on the 11th he sent 

 the measurements of two more, " bill at front 1\ and 2f, wing h% 

 and 5^," and on the 30th of November he recorded a fourth but 

 did not give measurements of bill and wing. 



Mr. Val Weston has kindly added further information in regard 

 to these big Pintails in letters. He first sent me a specimen (now in 

 the Society's Museum) which measured when dry, wing 5'35, bill at 

 gape 2-63, and then on the 2nd January 1910, wrote me as follows:— 

 "Yesterday I shot two more of these big snipes and also an ordinary 

 Pintail and a lot of Fantails. The difference between the big and 

 small forms is most marked and they are easily distinguished when 

 in the air. The measurements of the two are, wing, each 5^, 

 bill at front each 2\, weight both considerably over 5 ozs. Tail 

 feathers 22 and 23. The big Pintail does not come in at the same 

 time as the ordinary small birds. By the 1st September the country 

 is full of Pintail Snipe, but amongst them never one of these big- 

 birds. By October the Pintails have moved on and their place is 

 taken by Fantails, and it is then that we begin to look for the big- 

 birds . They come tvith the Fantails and not with the Pintails. By 

 the middle or end of February the Pintails begin to come back, 

 and in March there are three Pintails to one Fantail, but I have 

 never shot one of these snipes later than the 1 9th February, that is 

 to say, never during the northward migration of the Pintails. " 



From the inquiries I have made from sportsmen there 

 seems to be a very general idea that there is a foim of Pintail 

 which differs from the ordinary birds in being much larger, but an 

 examination of the skins sent to prove this show that these birds 



