322 GAME-BIRDS OF INDIA 



and feet would lead one to suppose ; individuals continually flying 

 up and alighting a few yards further on, and now and again the 

 whole flock rising and flying round, apparently without reason 

 or aim. 



" Sometimes it is very shy, especially in the early mornings and 

 evenings ; and though it will not, unless repeatedly fired at, fly far, 

 it will yet not let you approach within one hundred yards ; but, as a 

 rule, during the heat of the day, you may walk right in amongst 

 them. They are precisely the colour of the sand when basking, and 

 often the first notice you have of their proximity is the sudden patter 

 of their many wings as they rise and dart away, and the babel of 

 their cries, which, if the flock be a large one, is really startling for 

 a moment. Once up, they are off and away with a rapidity that 

 takes a good shot and a hard hitting gun to deal with satisfactorily, 

 but they rarely at mid-day go far, and if the sun is bright, you may 

 get shot after shot out of the same party by following them up. 



" Early in the morning and quite at dusk they come down to the 

 water to drink, by preference to fresh water, but, as at the Tso-Khar, 

 at times, to quite brackish water. 



" They are always noisy birds wlien moving about, uttering a call 

 somewhat like ' guk-guk ' to my ear, or again, as some people 

 syllabize, it ' ijak-yak,' ' caga-caga,' etc., etc., but they are specially 

 noisy in the evenings when they come down to drink, and quite late 

 in the evening, when wearied with the day's tramp in those high 

 regions, dinner discussed and the peaceful pipe achieved, one turns 

 in for the night, their characteristic double cry may still be heard 

 round the tents, pitched always, of course, when possible, near 

 water." 



" Mountaineer " remarks that they are met with in pairs, some- 

 times singly, and also in flocks of half-a-dozen or a dozen, on the 

 hills and upland plains, at from 14,000 to 17,000 feet. They lie 

 close until one gets within fifty or one hundred yards, and then fly 

 up with the usual chuckle, generally alighting again at no very great 

 distance." 



According to Blanford this " is a very noisy bird, often repeating 

 its clanging double note when on the wing. Some caged birds that 

 were given to me on the north frontier of Sikhim constantly uttered 

 this call. The flight is swift." 



Major F. M. Bailey says that he found " these birds in flocks of 

 from ten to twenty anywhere north of the Tangla from August to 

 February, and I have once seen them in May. They appear to have 



