HORNED ARGUS-PHEASANT. 



69 



just becoming tinged with gold as I stepped out of my little 

 tent into the bracing morning air. All traces of yester- 

 day's fatigue were gone, and much to my joy, the sight of 

 the injured eye was almost as clear as ever. At the shika- 

 ree's suggestion we left most of the impedimenta at the vil- 

 lage, only taking with us a man to carry our blankets and 

 food sufficient for the few days we intended passing on the 

 hill. In consequence of these little arrangements having 

 to be made, the h sun had risen over the eastern snow-peaks 

 before we had started. 



" Look, there's a gooral ! " exclaimed one of my compan- 

 ions in a hurried whisper, as he crouched down and pointed 

 to where a buck was perched among some rocks high above 

 us, basking in the rays of the morning sun. As his gaze 

 was not directed downwards, he had evidently not observed 

 us. The ground was favourable, so we had little difficulty 

 in circumventing him, when a bullet sent him scrambling 

 helplessly among the rocks. The shikaree was not long in 

 securing him, and after slinging him over the few things he 

 already had on his back, again took the lead upwards. Be- 

 fore we had gone much higher, three or four more gooral 

 sped away up the crags. I took a snap-shot at one of 

 them, which I missed. As we were going through a small 

 birch coppice we flushed a pair of large beautiful birds 

 here called " loongees," and generally known as the horned 

 argus-pheasant. Its habitat is always on the higher ranges, 

 where its wild peculiar call a kind of mewing sound may 

 sometimes be heard issuing from thickets in the pine-forests 

 and birch -woods near the snow -line. Being a very shy 

 bird, it is seldom or never met with in the open. 



About noon we reached a small kind of cavity among 

 some steep rocks, where the shikaree proposed we should 

 temporarily establish ourselves. After skinning and break- 

 ing up the gooral, I took a careful search over all the 

 ground in view with the spy -glass. There was a small 

 herd of young buck tahr far away above, near the sky-line ; 



