248 GLIMPSES OF INDIAN BIRDS 



manner. When this pronouncement has had time to 

 sink into the ears of his listeners, he repeats *' wowy 

 and continues to sound this impressive monotone at 

 intervals of a minute for several hours. 



The above are the three owls which are most often 

 heard in the plains of Northern India. Sometimes all 

 three species, like the orators in Hyde Park, address 

 the world simultaneously from neighbouring trees. 



There are numbers of other owls that disturb the 

 stillness of the night with more or less vigour, but it 

 would be tedious, if not impossible, to describe them 

 all. It must suffice to make mention of the low, 

 solemn booming durgoon durgoon, of the huge rock- 

 horned owl (Bubo bengalensis) and the wheezy 

 screech of the barn owl (Strix flammea). 



Another call, often heard shortly before dawn, is 

 doubtless usually believed to be that of an owl. This 

 is the deep, whoot, whoot, whoot of the coucal or crow 

 pheasant {Centropus sinensis), that curious chocolate- 

 winged black ground-cuckoo which builds its nest in a 

 dense thicket. 



Unfortunately for the peace of mankind the coucal 

 is not the only cuckoo that hfts up its voice in the 

 night. Three species of cuckoo exist in India which 

 are nocturnal as owls, as diurnal as crows, and as noisy 

 as a German band. A couple of hours' sleep in the 

 hottest part of the day appears to be ample for the 

 needs of these super-birds. From this short slumber 

 they awake, like giants refreshed, to spend the greater 

 portion of the remaining two-and-twenty hours in 

 shrieking at the top of their voices. 



