89 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 
times still roosting, long after the sun has risen above the 
horizon. As the mist rises off the valleys, and, gathering into 
little clouds, goes rolling up the hill-sides till lost in the ethereal 
blue, the Pea-Fowl descend from their perch on some huge 
s{mal or sal tree, and, threading their way in silence through 
the underwood, emerge into the fields, and make sad havoc 
with the channa, urad (both vetches), wheat, or rice. When 
sated, they retire into the neighbouring thin jungle, and there 
preen themselves, and dry their bedewed plumage in the sun. 
The cock stands on a mound, or a fallen trunk, and sends 
forth his well-known cry, ‘pehauz-pehauz,’ which is soon 
answered from other parts of the forest. The hens ramble about, 
or lie down dusting their plumage, and so they pass the early 
hours while the air is still cool,and hundreds of little birds 
are flitting and chirruping about the scarlet blossoms of the 
‘palds,’ or the ‘simal.’ As the sun rises, and the dewy 
sparkle on the foliage dries up, the air becomes hot and still, 
the feathered songsters vanish into shady nooks, and our 
friends the Pea-Fowl depart silently into the coolest depths of 
the forest, to some little sandy stream canopied by verdant 
boughs, or to thick beds of reeds and grass, or dense thorny 
brakes overshadowed by mossy rocks, where, though the sun 
blaze over the open country, the green shades are cool, and 
the silence of repose unbroken, though the shrill cry of the 
Cicada may be heard ringing faintly through the wood. 
“These birds cease to congregate soon after the crops are 
off the ground. ‘The pairing-season is in the early part of the 
hot weather. The Peacock has then assumed his full train, 
that is, the longest or last rows of his upper tail-coverts, which 
he displays of a morning, strutting about before his wives. 
These strange gestures, which the natives gravely denominate 
the Peacock’s nautch, or dance, are very similar to those of a 
Turkey-cock, and accompanied by an occasional odd shiver of 
the quills, produced apparently by a convulsive jerk of the 
abdomen. The same thing occurs in a Turkey-cock, a little 
