THE GAME BIRDS OF INDIA, BURMA AND CEYLON. 905 



the Pintail Snipe on its southern migration and on entering its 

 winter resorts is decidedly Western and it would appear that the 

 Jack in Asia carries this Western trend to an extreme. 



Within Indian limits the distribution of the Jack Snipe is very 

 irregular and they are not nearly as common as either the Pintail 

 or Fantail though on rare occasions they may be come across in 

 considerable numbers. It is to be found more or less all over the 

 Indian continent at different times during the cold season, but 

 there are few places in which one can rely on obtaining more than 

 an odd bird or two with any certainty. 



Tickell says " on one or two occasions, in very jungly places 

 of bog and rank weeds interspersed among rice cultivation, I have 

 found the " Jacks" almost monopolizing the ground, to the exclu- 

 sion of the Common Snipe, but this is very rare ; 1 think I have 

 met with more to the Southward, on the borders of Orissa, than in 

 any part of Central India, on either side of the Ganges. In the 

 Calcutta markets, where the Common Snipe is to be seen in heaps, 

 dead and alive, the Jacks are seldom to be met with. They seem 

 to me to take to the more retired parts of the country such as 

 Singh Boom, where, especially in the ghat purrum (beyond the 

 Ghats) the rice cultivation struggles for mastery with the swampy 

 jungle." 



In regard to this note Hume remarks : " He is quite wrong, 

 however, about the Calcutta market, to which thousands are yearly 

 brought." 



It is, however, very doubtful whether Tickell was really wrong- 

 in his estimate, as Finn says, when discussing this same point, 

 there is no doubt that the numbers do fluctuate considerably year 

 by year, but he watched the Calcutta markets very carefully for 

 nine years and in the year 1882, 83 and 84 I did the same and 

 never did either of us see the Jack Snipe exposed for sale in any 

 quantities. Certainly in no year did the Jack Snipe number on 

 an average one in a hundred of the various snipe thus exposed. 



No very careful record was kept in Hume's day as to the com- 

 parative number of the various species obtained and all estimates 

 made were very rough and in many cases possibly not quite 



