908 
NIIMENIUS LINEATUS. 
the Sambhur Lake, it is, according to Mr. Adam, frequently met with in flocks of seven or eight. In the 
Calcutta district it is commoner at the beginning and end of the cold season than during the middle. In 
Burmah it is said to have been procured at Thayetmyo ; and in the Irrawaddy delta it is extremely abundant, 
says Dr. Armstrong, both along the coast and on the eastern side of the estuary ot the river. In Tenasserim 
it is prettv common along the coast and a little distance inland. Mr. Davison noticed that the majority left 
in April; but many remained during June, July, and August, and these must have been stationary non - 
breeding birds. In the Andamans it is not uncommon on the creeks along the shores, and was not observed 
by Mr. Davison after the 8th April ; but Mr. Hume has received specimens, shot in August and September, 
from Pt. Blair. 
This eastern form of Curlew ranges, according to Messrs. Schlegel and Swinhoe, from Japan (where 
it is the N. major of Temminck and the former author) down the coast of China and Eormosa to Hainan, 
and thence into the Malay islands, where it has been found in Java, Sumatra, and Borneo. Mr. Swinhoe 
procured it in March in Hainan, and says that it was common in Hoehow harbour until the beginning 
of April. It has been obtained in Sumatra by Ilenrici, in Java by Kuhl and Van Hasselt, and in Southern 
Borneo by Crookewit, while in the Leyden Museum there is a specimen from Halmahera. As regards Central 
Asia, its distribution is not very well defined. Prjevalsky speaks of it as Numenius major, and writes that it 
is common in South-east Mongolia from the end of March to the end of April, where it frequents the 
shores of small lakes and puddles in the burnt-out steppes. He found it breeding in the Hoang-ho valley, and 
noticed the first migrants arriving at Koko-nor on the loth of March, at the end of which month numerous 
flocks of fifteen to twenty were seen together. At Lake Ilanka they were rather common, arriving about the 
end of March, and some of them stopping to breed about the middle of April. In Amoor Land Schrenck 
seems only to have met with the southern species above referred to, and which he writes of as N. australis, 
Gould. 
Concerning its range in Western Asia I am not prepared to speak. Swinhoe, on the evidence of the 
identity of the South-African form with the Indian, supposes that it is migratory in the cool season down 
the east coast of Africa from India; but Layard speaks of it as a stationary species in South Africa. It is 
probably this Curlew that passes through Turkestan, occurring rarely, according to Severtzoff, in the eastern 
portions of the country. Canon Tristram did not obtain specimens, though he saw them on the coast of 
Palestine; and the birds that he considered to be the European Curlew may have belonged to this form. 
1 have not examined skins from Egypt or Abyssinia, and cannot speak as to their identity ; but I have 
mentioned one Greek specimen above which is labelled Athens (whether correctly or not I cannot say). As 
regards South Africa, Layard writes : — “The Curlew is not uncommon on our sea-board throughout its whole 
extent. I never heard of its breeding in the colony, though it is found here throughout the year. I met 
with it up the east coast as far as the Line.” It was obtained at Mozambique by Peters ; and the Curlew 
procured at the Seychelles and in Rodriguez by Mr. E. Newton must have been this species. The European 
form, which migrates down the west coast from Morocco, does not seem to extend further south than Ashantee. 
jjdlits . — In Ceylon the Curlew frequents sand banks and sand flats left bare by the daily receding of the 
tide marshy land near the estuaries of large rivers, the margins of salt lagoons, and may sometimes be seen 
assembled on grass-land near salt lakes and leways. It is, however, seen in far greater numbers on the tidal 
foreshores of the open coast and the islands on the north-west than it is about backwaters a little distance 
inland. No shore-bird can be more interesting to the lover of the wild haunts of seafowl than the Curlew, 
llis fine note sounding clearly above the roar of the sea, or startling the ear of the voyager on a moonlight 
night as he is cruising in a Jaffna canoe on the smooth waters of the north-west coast, has something 
inexpressibly wild in it, and reminds him of days gone by when he stalked the same wary, cautious bird on 
the iron-bound coasts of Scotland, or on the grand hill-moors of Yorkshire and Westmoreland, and listened 
to the same free, far-reaching cry. The time to see them to perfection is when the tide is beginning to 
leave the waste flats off the north-west coast of Ceylon, and small parties of two, three, six, and more are 
wending their way towards some chosen feeding-ground, on which the water is just becoming shallow enough 
for them to wade in. From all directions up and down the coast they come, and shortly after the ground 
is bare a vast flock of several hundreds are stalking about, uttering their sociable note, quite different from 
