heads completely at the first shot and will often fly straight towards the guns, 

 discovering their mistake in time, only to swerve to right or left, offering the 

 while an excellent mark. On alighting, the frightened birds scurry up through 

 the woods with wonderful agility and gaining the summits of the ridges once 

 more break cover and sail away across to the opposite ridge. In this way they 

 very soon outdistance the sportsman, who will shortly lose all traces of them. 



There seems to be but one representative of the grouse family in these 

 provinces. Pallas' three-toed sand grouse {Syrrhaptes paradoxus) is found on the 

 great plains during the winter months. This bird is really an inhabitant of 

 the great Mongolian Desert and Southern Siberia, but in severe winters it 

 frequently seeks the slightly less bitter weather of the Chihii and Shansi 

 plains. Its flight is very swift and is accompanied with a shrill whistling, 

 caused by the rapid beating of the long pointed wings. The feet of this 

 pretty little bird look ver}' much like those of a rabbit, the toes being short, 

 padded and covered with hairlike feathers, which are continued up the leg. 



Two varieties of pigeons may be classed with the game birds, but one of 

 these, the stock dove (Columba intermedia) is practically a domesticated breed 

 frequenting the habitations of man. The other, a variety of rock dove 

 (C rupestris) differing from the European form in having a broad white band 

 across the tail, inhabits the loess gullies and rocky ravines of the foothills. 

 These two species may often be seen in vast flocks feeding together by 

 hundreds on the cultivated fields, along the roads, or in the boulder-strewn 

 mountain valleys. 



Two other members of the dove family also frequent the woods and 

 groves, one [Turtur decaocta) inhabiting the plains, and the other, a turtle dove 

 {Turtur chinensis) , preferring mountainous regions. 



In certain localities the lordly bustard (Otis dyboivskii) is very common. 

 Wherever large level tracts exist, be they uplands or lowlands, plateau or 

 plain, there this, the prince of game birds, is to be found. The sandy 

 stretches of the Ordos, the watery plain of Hsi-an Fu, the loess plateaux of 

 central Shensi, and the Shansi tableland — all are equally favoured by this 

 handsome bird. It does not, however, breed in these localities, but at the 

 approach of summer flies northward to the solitudes of the Gobi Desert or 

 Southern Siberia, where the female raises a large brood. 



We now come to the geese and ducks, a group so large that justice 

 cannot be done to them in the limited space at my disposal. During the 

 spring and autumn the bean goose [Anser segetum) appears in vast flocks. 

 Spreading over the plains in their hundreds and thousands they resemble an 



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