Tas COUMON OR FANTAIL 
oul Pa. 
Gallinago ceelestis, Frenzel. 
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Vernacular Names.—[Chaha, 4. W. Provinces, Oudh; Bharka, Bharak, 
(Hindee), Central Himalayas, Nepal, &c. ; Chegga, Cheyga, Lower Bengal 3 
Cheryga, Dibrugarh, Assam; Check lonbi, Manipur; Tibud, Pan-lawa, 
(Mahrati), Ratnagiri; More-oolan, Oolan, (Tamil), Muku- -puredi, (Telegu), 
Southern India; Kadakecho, Orissa ; Ket-batta, (Lurka-Koles) ; Kas-watua, 
Ceylon ; Pashalek, Afghanistan ; Maharamche, (Turki), Yérkand ; 
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eS B) HERE is no corner of the Empire, from Ceylon, the 
Nicobars, and the Pakchan on the south to the Habb 
river and Gilgit on the west, and Manipur and 
Sadiya on the east, in which the Common Snipe 
does not occur, aS a commoner or rarer visitant, or 
at any rate straggler, during the winter, and some 
few at least breed in Kashmir. 
In describing the distribution of the Pintail, I have 
said so much of that of the present species that I need not 
now enter into any great detail—suffice it to say that the two 
Species are, to a great extent, complementary to each other in 
their ranges, the one being most abundant where the other is 
rarest, and vice versd, that in Oudh, the N.-W. Provinces, 
the Punjab, and the Himalayas west of the Jumna, in Sindh, 
Rajputana, Cutch, Kathiawar, the Central India Agency 
(excluding the Bondela States), and the western portions of the 
Central Provinces, this is ¢ze Snipe, and in all suitable localities 
very plentiful. That again in the hilly country between the 
Ganges and the Godavari, Chota Nagpur, the Tributary Mahals, 
&c., this is the predominant form, while in the Andamans and 
Nicobars, and Tenasserim Proper it is extremely rare, and in 
the rest of British Burma,* Bengal, east of the Brahmaputra, 
and Assam, decidedly less common than the Pintail and in 
many districts quite scarce. 
In Independent or Upper Burma this species is fairly 
abundant in suitable localities during the cold season. In the 
* “The Common English Snipe is everywhere rare in Pegu, compared with the 
Pintail. It does not appear to arrive so early. It is found in much the same places, 
and bags almost always contain one or two specimens of this species.” —Zugene 
W, Oates. 
