1831.] 
On some of the Scolopacidee of Nepal. 
235 
female, and I have always found the larger to be the blacker — the smaller, the 
redder, and, I should say, the more brilliant, bird. The following is an accurate 
description of the perfect state of the plumage : front half of the head, above, 
dull gray blue, or ash, with a black mark at the base of the bill, and here and 
there visible indications of the black bars on each feather within : back half of 
the head, and dorsal surface of the neck, black ; divided transversely by three (or, 
including the foremost, four) pale yellow red bars : from the mouth, through the 
eyes, and a little beyond them, a broad black line : parallel to the above line, 
another shorter and narrower, across the ears : orbits, bulf : remainder of the 
sides of the head, reddish buff, dotted with black : sides of the neck, the same, 
but darker, and the dots elongated to short transverse bars, as you descend the 
neck : chin, immaculate white : pectoral surface of the neck, dull reddish yel- 
low, cross-barred, with brown black zigzags, and exhibiting, in front, a gorget 
formed of the fine black and cliesnut hues of the back : breast, the same, mar- 
gined round the shoulders of the wings with the lower horn of the black and 
chesnut lunation beginning above : belly, to the vent and thighs, the same ; but 
paler, with the difference of intensity in the ground colour, distinctly marked 
across the bottom of the breast : under tail-coverts, the same, but the ground- 
colour and marks, both brighter, and the latter often assuming a lanceolate 
form 1 : upper parts of the plumage, elegantly barred, spotted, streaked, mar- 
bled, and variegated, with black brown, black blue gray, buff rusty red, and 
chesnut red, disposed in rows, crossed and interrupted at intervals, by lines and 
marks of various shapes, in a manner defying description — save only so tar as 
it may be distinctly noted, that two parallel lines of the palest of those colours in- 
variably run lengthwise down either side of the back, margining the scapulars, 
both above and below ; bottom of the back, and superior tail-coverts, the same, 
but less variegated, and redder : quills, dusky black, triangularly indented on 
both webs with red : tail, jet black, with the tip blue gray, above, and glossy 
white below ; and the webs indented with reddish, as in the quills : bill, fleshy 
brown, with a cold blue tinge, and dark tip : legs, bluish fleshy gray : irides, clear 
brown. 
Gallinago Media — Common Snipe. 
In Nepal, as in England, the snipe is not entirely migratory ; some birds re- 
maining with us throughout the year. But the greater portion go and come, like 
the majority of the Grallutores. They arrive towards the close of the rains, in 
All ? llst and September — and depart when the drought is at its height, or in 
Ma y- f hey are most abundant at the close of the rains, when the whole Conn- 
ie' * s covered with rice then ready for the sickle ; every field presenting a swamp, 
j Ust fre ed from water. 
fr the spring, they are found in the corn and mustard fields, near to permanent 
^" 'Unps; of which there are many in Nepal. In the winter, they are scarce, from 
want of cover. 
fr Nepal, the snipe is decidedly gregarious — and, when not stinted for feeding 
- U, und, exceedingly so. In October, in a single rice-field, twenty and thirty birds 
be found, huddled together : and every Indian Sportsman knows, that in a 
bn >pe- country, his two guns are never suffered to grow cold. I am told, the like 
lS Case in Ireland, as well as in those few counties of England, which alone 
re suited to the habits of the bird. England is not, generally, a snipe-country : 
to *kis circumstance I attribute Shaw’s error in supposing, that snipes do 
1 Vide Shaw, xii. 45. 
