RIYN CHjEA CAPENSIS. 
(THE PAINTED SNIPE.) 
Scolopax capensis, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 246 (1766). 
Ballus bengalensis, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 263 (1766). 
Bhynchcea orientalis , Horsf. Tr. Linn. Soc. xiii. p. 193 (1821). 
Bhynchcea varieyata, Vieill. Gal. Ois. ii. p. 109, pi. 240 (1824) ; Schlegel, Mus. P.-B. 
Scolopaces, p. 16 (1864). 
Bhynchcea picta. Gray, Sykes, P. Z. S. 1832, p. 164. 
Bhynchcea bengalensis (Linn.), Blyth, Cat. B. Mus. A. S. B. p. 273 (1849); Kelaart, Pro- 
dromus, Cat. p. 135 (1852); Layard, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. 1854, xiv. p. 266 ; Jerdon, 
B. of Ind. iii. p. 677 (1864); Blyth, Ibis, 1867, p. 167; Blanford, Zool. Abyss, p. 432 
(1870); Swinhoe, P. Z. S. 1871, p. 408 ; Holdsw. P. Z. S. 1872, p. 473 ; Hume, Str. 
Feath. 1873, p. 235; Salvadori, Ucc. di Borneo, p. 335 (1874); Legge, Ibis, 1874, 
p. 28; id. J. A. S. (Ceylon Branch) p. 53 (1874); Oates, Str. Feath. 1875, p. 346; 
Hume, Nests and Eggs, iii. p. 586 ; Legge, Ibis, 1875, p. 402 ; Butler & Hume, Str. 
Feath. 1876, p. 15 ; Fairbank,'L c. p. 263 ; Butler & Hume, ibid. 1877, p. 223 ; Wardlaw 
Ramsay, Ibis, 1877, p. 469; Blakiston & Pryer, Ibis, 1878, p. 225 ; Hume, Str. Feath. 
1878 (B. of Tenass.), p. 459; Davidson & Wender, ibid. 1878, vii. p. 89; Ball, t.c. 
p. 228; Cripps, t. c. p. 302; Hume (List Ind. B.), ibid. 1879, p. 112. 
Bhynchcea capensis (Linn.), Layard, B. of S, Afr. no. 625 (1867); Shelley, B. of Egypt, 
p. 250, pi. xi. (1872); Yon Heuglin, Orn. N.Ost-Afr. t. ii. p. 1211 (1873); Walden, 
Trans. Zool. Soc. 1875, ix. p. 235; Barratt, Ibis, 1876, p. 212; Tweeddale, P. Z. S. 
1877, p. 551. 
Cape Snipe, Latham; Becassine clu cap de Bonne-Ksperance , Bee. de Madagascar, Bee. de la 
Chine, Buffon ; Goldschnepfe of German authors ; King Snipe, “ Painter Sportsmen in 
Ceylon. Pengung, Java (Horsf.); Choseh hindi, Arabic (Yon Heugl.); Tama-shgi 
Japan (Blakiston) ; Bav-Bav, Madagascar (E. Newton). 
Baja licesivatuwa, Baja watuwa, Sinhalese. 
Adult male. Length 9 - o to 9'8 inches ; wing 5'2 to 5 - 4 ; tail 1‘5 to 1*6 ; tarsus 1‘7 to 1'8 ; mid toe and claw 1*65 to 
1-75 ; bill to gape (straight) 1-8 to 1-9. 
Iris brown ; bill, basal half of upper mandible and all but tip of lower dusky greenish (palest in the female), changing 
to reddish or livid brown on the remainder; legs and feet sickly green or greenish leaden. 
Lores and crown olivaceous blackish, with a buff mesial stripe down to the base of bill, and a broad band of the same 
behind and passing round the eye ; neck behind and on the sides drab-grey, mottled with black, and paling on the 
fore neck and chest, across which the colour is edged with blackish ; a dark stripe below the prbital band; chin, 
gorge, and lower face whitish buff, passing into the colour of the fore neck ; back, lesser tertial coverts, rump, 
and tail cinereous, with black cross-pencillings and bars and spots of buff-yellow ; interscapulars, scapulars, and 
tertials clouded with greenish black and glossy olivaceous brown, with a purple sheen in some lights, many of the 
feathers barred and marked with buff, and some of the scapulars with broad central and lateral stripes of buff 
and white ; wing-covcrts olivaceous green, barred and spotted with buff, the spots edged with black ; quills fine 
grey, with wavy cross rays of black and some bar-spots of white near the tips of the secondaries, the outer webs 
spotted with large black-edged ocelli of buff, the interspaces towards the base in the outer primaries being black ; 
breast, lower parts, axillaries, and median under wing-coverts white, passing through the olive and blackish sides 
of the upper breast in a band, which extends round to the shoulders. 
