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Show 1873.J GAZELLES OF INDIA AND PERSIA. 315 perhaps somewhat further. Its northern limit is ill known ; but it probably the Gazelle of Meshed and Herat. On the east it extends nearly to the frontier of India ; it is common in parts of Afghanistan ; and specimens from Kandahar exist in the Museum of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta. 2. GAZELLA BENNETTI. The distribution of this Gazelle in India is the following. It is found throughout the Panjab, North-west Provinces, Rajputana, Sindh (unless replaced in part by the next species), Kachh, Kathi-awad, Gujrat, and the whole Bombay Presidency, with the exception of the western ghats and the low land or Konkan along the western coast south of the neighbourhood of Daman. It is also met with in the Narbada and Tapti valleys, Bandelkand, the Soil valley, and Rewah, in the Nagpur and Chanda country, Berar, the Hydrabad territories, and other parts of Southern India, with the complete exception of the Malabar coast and the adjacent hills. Jerdon says it is found "throughout India in suitable localities, unknown in Lower Bengal and the Malabar coast," and leaves it to be inferred that the Gazelle is met with on the plains in the southern portion of the peninsula; but, according to Col. M'Masters (' Notes on Jerdon's Mammals,' p. 141), none are known to occur much south of the Krishna river; and Col. Douglas Hamilton, another good authority, assures me that this agrees with his own experience. Its eastern limit may be roughly drawn by a line from Dinapur to Jabalpur, and thence due south till it intersects the east coast of India*, It is, so far as I know, wanting in the Ganges valley east of Benares, in Eastern Behar, the Santal Parganahs, Chutia Nagpur, Birbhum, &c, Chhatisgarh, the Mahanadi valley, Orissa, Bastar, and the east coast generally north of the river Krishna f. The Nilgai, Four-horned .Antelope, and Indian Antelope range to the east of this line, all being found in suitable localities nearly as far east as the longitude of Calcutta; and the last-named occurs in Lower Bengal, and even in the western confines of Assam. In short, the Gazelle inhabits the portions of India which I have elsewhere (J. A. S. B. 1870, vol. xxxix. pt. ii. p. 336) specified as the Panjab province, and the Gangetic and Deccan subprovinces of the Indian province, with the northern portion of the Madras subprovince ; whilst it is wanting in the Bengal subprovince of the Indian province, in tbe provinces of Malabar and Eastern Bengal, and probably in the southern part of the Madras subprovince. Hitherto G. bennetti has not, so far as I am aware, been known to range west of India; but in the course of m y recent journey through Baluchistan I obtained a specimen of a Gazelle (a male) at Bampur, about 450 miles west of the Indian frontier, which appears to me undistinguishable from the Indian species. The coloration * I may be in error as to the exact limit; but I think the above is a close approximation. t Amongst, other animals the range of which in India is, so far as I know, nearly coextensive with that of the Gazelle, are the two species of Sand-Grouse, Pterocles exustus and Pt. fasciatus, and the Indian Bustard, Eupodotis edwardsii. |