185 



A NOTE ON BIRDS FROM CENTRAL INDIA IN 

 BARNES'S HANDBOOK. 



By W. T. Blanfoed. 



In Lieut. H. E. Barnes's " Handbook to the Birds of the Bom- 

 bay Presidency," I find some species included that, to the best of my 

 knowledge, do not inhabit Western India. Several of these, 1 find, 

 are given on Jerdon's authority as occurring in " Central India," with 

 the remark that no other observer has found them in that area. For 

 instance, of Strix Candida (p. 61) Mr. Barnes says : — " Dr. Jerdon 

 procured the grass-owl in Central India, as did also Colonel Tickell. 

 Neither Colonel Swinhoe nor myself met with it there." 



Mr. Barnes and Colonel Swinhoe understand by Central India the 

 area now known as the Central Indian Agency between Rajputana 

 and the Central Provinces, and particularly the neighbourhood of 

 Mhow, Indore, and Neemuch. This is the country to which their paper 

 "On the Birds of Central India" ("Ibis," 1885, pp. 52, 124) refers. 

 The Central Indian Agency, as represented on maps, comprises a con- 

 siderable tract to the eastward, including Bundelkhund and Rewah, but 

 these are not, I think, regarded by Mr. Barnes as within the country 

 to which his work on the "Birds of the Bombay Presidency " is restrict- 

 ed, for he speaks of the book in the preface as " dealing exclusively 

 with that portion of India proper garrisoned by Bombay troops." 



Jerdon's Central India is a much wider area. In the introduction to 

 Vol. I of the " Birds of India," he divides India into Northern, Cen- 

 tra], and Southern, and he thus writes : " Central India includes 

 Nagpore, north of the Godavery, the valley of the Nerbudda, with 

 Saugor and Mhow, Bundelkhund and the countries extending on the east 

 towards Cuttack and Midnapore" I put the last words in italics, 

 because, as will be seen, they contain the explanation of Mr. Barnes' 

 mistake, or what I think is his mistake. Dr. Jerdon's Central India 

 included, besides the Central Indian Agency, the whole of the Central 

 Provinces* and the region commonly known as Chutia or Chota 

 Nagpore. 



* Jerdon^ book is dated 1862, the year after the Central Provinces were formed 

 out of the Nagpore country and the region formerly known as the Saugor and 

 Nerbudda territories, with some adjoining districts. The name by which the area 

 is now known is never, so far as I am aware, used by him. 



