MONAUL 215 



with the bill alone as a rule. In the wild state they do not care 

 for corn, but will eat it in captivity, especially wheat ; but any- 

 one keeping them should always supply chopped roots as well. 



They are not very sociable, and old males are often found 

 alone ; their spurs are short, and one does not hear about their 

 fighting m a wild state, though in captivity a strong male will 

 hunt a weaker one to death, and I have known a vicious 

 youngster to completely scalp a hen. But, on the whole, they are 

 gentle, quiet birds compared with the excitable pheasants. The 

 display of the cock is curious — he begins by bending down 

 his head and expanding the turquoise eye-patch ; then he sets 

 out his wings without fully expanding them, and raises and 

 spreads his tail, thus showing all his top-colour at once. When 

 thus at full show he parades with mincing gait round the hen, 

 now' and then hopping in a way strangely out of place for so 

 heavy and dignified a bird. He often has but one mate, but 

 in localities where the species is common several may fall to his 

 lot. In fact, Wilson, the " Mountaineer " so well known in 

 Indian sporting literature for his unrivalled accounts of our 

 Indian hill game-birds, found that by rigidly preserving hens he 

 could market male skins of this species and the western tragopan 

 by hundreds yearly without decreasing the stock, so that 

 polygamy is quite a workable arrangement for the species, 

 although Mr. St. Quintin, who has bred it in confinement in 

 England, finds that the cock looks after and broods the chicks as 

 well as the hen. But this may have been due to isolation ; the 

 general impression in India is that the hen only tends the brood. 



Owing to the value of its jewelled plumage the bird has been 

 liable to be much poached by natives, who capture it with nooses 

 and dead-falls, all of which devices ought to be strictly forbidden, 

 as they are fatal to hens as well as cocks. To the legitimate 

 exploitation of the males no reasonable person should object, but 

 these game-birds need careful protection, and if the natives' 

 poaching propensities could be directed to the destruction of the 

 numerous vermin of India a great point would be gained. In 

 this connection it should be mentioned that the hawk-eagle is an 

 inveterate foe of this bird and of tragopans, while no doubt the 

 marten accounts for a good many. 



