206 THE COMMON TEAL, 
the Mallard does ; but though Adams says that they remain 
all the year round in Kashmir, no one has since confirmed this 
fact, nor, so far as I know, found the nest within our limits. 
Elsewhere, the Teal is common in Independent Burmah, and 
occurs in Northern Siam,* is plentiful in China, Mongolia, and 
rather rare in Eastern Turkestan,+ in all of which it is mainly a 
bird of passage or winter visitant. It is found throughout 
Siberia from Kamschatka to Russia, breeding everywhere, but 
rarely far inside the Arctic Circle; it occurs in Western Turkestan, 
in many parts of which it breeds, throughout Persia, Afghanistan, 
Beluchistan, Mesopotamia, Palestine, and Asia Minor, in which 
latter a few are said to breed, while to the rest it is only a 
winter visitant. 
It is more or less abundant also, at one season or another, 
in every part of Europe (where it breeds occasionally as far 
south, at any rate, as the 4oth degree North Latitude), and of 
North Africa as far south as Abyssinia, and has been record- 
ed from Madeira and the Azores on one of which it breeds. 
It is very common in Iceland, but in Europe asin Asia does not 
seem to stray in any numbers, within the Arctic Circle. 
Lastly, it straggles to Greenland and the Eastern Coasts of 
North America, being replaced elsewhere in that region by 
a barely separable species, Q. carolinensis, 
IT Is difficult to say when the Common Teal does arrive, as the 
period varies a good deal in different years, and in different parts 
of the country. But in the more northern plains portion of the 
Mr. Oates says :—‘* The Common English Teal is nowhere met with in the Pegu 
Province in large quantities. One or two birds may generally be found on large 
sheets of water in company with the commoner kinds of Teal. It is, of course, only 
a cold weather visitor.” 
* In this and many other cases it will be noticed that I have made no reference 
to Southern Siam, Cambodia, Anam, Cochin China, and Tonquin, though in many 
cases one or more of these appear to lie within the range of the species referred to. 
In regard to Northern Siam I have some little information, and hope hereafter to 
have more ; but in regard to Southern Siam, beyond a list of the birds in the Paris 
Museum kindly prepared for me by Mr. D.G. Elliot, Schomburgk’s paper in the 
Lbis (1864), and Gould’s list (P. Z. S., 1859), I have zo information ; and in regard to 
the other provinces mentioned, although I believe that lists have been Jrinfed, if not 
published, in Paris, I have utterly failed to procure copies. It must not, therefore, 
be concluded that any species does ot extend to one or more of these, because I 
say nothing about their so doing—on the contrary, this very species most probably 
occurs in Tonquin --it is simply that I have no information on the subject. 
*+ Henderson says in our Lahore to Yarkand :—‘‘ The Common Teal was never 
seen either on the way to or in Yarkand ; the first specimen was met with on the 
return journey, near the hot springs at Gokra, at an elevation of between 15,000 and 
10,000 feet. Later in October they were seen on the Indus, near Lé, and at Kargil, 
both in Ladakh. Probably this species does not breed so far south as Yarkand, and 
the birds, seen on the return journey, were doubtless migrating to their winter quar- 
ters in Hindostan.” 
The second Yarkand Mission obtained several there, and in the case of the third 
Scully writes :—*‘ The Common Teal was only obtained at Kashghar in November 3 
at Sughuchak near Varkand, by Mr. Shaw, in January ; and at Beshkant, in the 
beginning of February. I was told that it migrated northwards to breed,” 
