Major J. Bicldulph on the Birds of Gilgit. 35 



III. — On the Birds of Gilgit. By Major John Biddulph*. 



The birds enumerated in the following list were collected 

 during a residence of two years in Gilgit, a tract of country 

 the ornithology of which has not yet been studied. As Gilgit 

 is known but to few, a brief sketch of the locality will be 

 useful. 



In the north-west corner of the Cashmere dominions, 

 where the Indus, after a north-north-west course of nearly 

 five hundred miles, makes a sudden turn to the south, the 

 Gilgit river joins the great stream on the right bank, after 

 draining a very large extent of country north and west of 

 the Indus. Its most western source is in the mountains at the 

 head of the Swat valley. Further east a large affluent joins it 

 in Yassin, which takes its rise in the Hindoo Koosh. Along 

 this stream migrants from the Oxus valley find their way to 

 the Indus. Further east still is its third and largest affluent, 

 the Hunza river, of which one of the branches rises on the 

 southern slope of the mountains that enclose the Tagh- 

 dooughash Pamir, and the other on the western slope of the 

 mountains that form the w-atershed between it and the valley 

 of the Yarkund river. All around rise snow-clad mountains 

 of great height, the ridges being from 13,000 feet to 17,000 

 feet above sea-level, while the number of lofty peaks and 

 glaciers is not equalled by any tract of similar extent in the 

 Himalayas. 



Twenty-four miles from the Indus, at an elevation of little 

 less than 5000 feet, is the fort of Gilgit. The valley, which 

 is here about two miles broad, is barren and rocky, save in 

 the spots of cultivation, which are few and far between. 

 The cultivated spots themselves are thickly wooded. Higher 

 up the valley contracts, and the cultivated spots are nearer 

 together. The base of the mountains consists of precipitous 

 bare rock; but above 7000 feet deep glens, pine-forests, 

 and grassy slopes meet the eye everywhere up to the snow- 



* [Dr. J. Scully, who is so often referred to by Major Biddulph, has 

 Mudly added some footnotes to this paper, which are distinguished by his 

 initials. — Edd.] 



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