rat iiiiii flmimi. 



Sypheotis bengalensis, P. X. £. Mailer. 



Vernacular ITameS- — [Charas, Charat, Charj, iV. W. Provinces, Oudh, &c, 

 Dabar, Nepal Tarai ; male Ablac, female Bor, *'« »w«}' /ar/j of the Tarai ; 

 Ooloo Moora, Ooloo Moira, Assam.] 



HE Bengal Florican is almost confined to Eastern 

 Bengal,* the valley of Assam, the Bhutan Duars, 

 and those portions of Bengal, Oudh, and the North- 

 Western Provinces lying north of the Ganges. Jerdon 

 says that it spreads through the valley of the 

 Jumna into Rajputana, the Cis-Sutlej States, and 

 parts of the Punjab ; but this is wrong. It is the 

 Houbara that is found in these localities, not the Bengal Florican ; 

 but sportsmen constantly call the Houbara the Florican, and 

 hence the mistake. I have never seen the true Florican any- 

 where west of the Kadar of the Ganges, except as a rare 

 straggler in the Dun ; and there again it does not, to the best 

 of my belief, extend further west than the Kadar of the Jumna. 

 In Meerut I have killed both the Houbara and the Likh, but 

 it is only when you get quite down into the Kadar of the 

 Ganges at Hastinapur and Makhdumpur, or again southwards 

 below Garhmuktesar, that you meet the true Florican, and here 

 we used to pick up a few couples every cold season. 



This species has been recorded from Tipperah and Sylhet, 

 but Captain Williamson tells me he has never seen it in 

 the latter, and both he and Mr. Inglis say the same as regards 

 Cachar. 



This Florican is essentially Indian, and extends, so far as we 

 know, nowhere beyond the limits of the empire. It is possible, 

 however, that it may hereafter be found to occur in the country 

 immediately east of Assam. 



MR. HODGSON'S monograph of this species still continues the 

 most exhaustive account we have of it, and from it I reproduce, 

 with slight alterations, the following : — 



" Tarai is an Indian term equivalent to Pays Bas, Landes, 

 Marches, and Marshes, of European tongues ; and the name 

 Tarai is applied, par excellence, to a low-lying, moist and rarely 

 redeemed tract of level waste, extending outside the Sal forest 



* It is found, however, occasionally as far west as Nuddea at any rate. 



