802. JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIX. 



him. What a handsome bird and what spurs! Even a game cock 

 might have envied them. 



On retracing our steps (this bird had gone back) 1 notice the rotting 

 trunk of a tree with small pieces of the rotted wood scattered under- 

 neath it. I pause to examine it, and the hill man says that is what the 

 pheasant was feeding on, and went further to explain that large insects 

 bore holes in the rotten wood, and the pheasants dig them out and 

 eat them. A further walk along the path and a f^titt climb up to the 

 ridge and another cock-pheasant is added to our bag, and yet another 

 got away unshot at ; there did not seem to be anything but solitary 

 old cocks here. 



Now for some light refreshment and a rest for a couple of hours 

 in the shade, then 1 wake my slumbering companion, and we proceed 

 plunging downwards through the jungle, reaching a well-worn path 

 after an hour's tramp. 



We have now left the haunts of the koklass. They seldom come as 

 low as this in October, but we shall here find — nearer tlie haunts of 

 man — the kalij ; we can see the tin rooms of the Gali Irum whence we 

 started, about five miles away in the distance, and we now wend 

 our way in that direction hoping to pick up a kalij or two on the 

 way. The khud here is broken up into a series of small nullahs 

 se})arated by sharp ridges ; in the nullahs the vegetation is dense 

 and rank, while on the ridges there are only somewhat stunted 

 fir trees, but the bareness is made up for by the ground being 

 carpeted in places by the blue gentian which grows only on the 

 bare ridges. We now come to a level piece of ground about an acre 

 in extent, in which the forest officer has a nursery of deodars. 

 Into these the little lady makes a dash, and during the next minute 

 or two I am kept busy. Six birds rise alm('st simultaneously, one comes 

 back towards me and the remainder make off for the khud side. I let 

 go one ban-el at the first-mentioned, but he passes on; so quickly swing- 

 ing round the second barrel is directed at one just as ho disjippears 

 behind a tree, a lot of leaves fall, and three or four feathers drift out on 

 the breeze ; my man following a hurried direction from me h;i3 made 

 his way round and up the khud, as if he heads off the birds ti at have 

 gone that way, one or two of the young ones may squat in tlie bushes 

 between him and me. In the meantime two more birds rise and 

 make off to join the rest, but I have got a bit more forward and on 



