434 THE ARGUS PHEASANT. 



Though Pea-fowls invariably roost in trees, yet they make their nests 

 on the ground, and ordinarily on a bank raised above the common 

 level, where in some sufficient bush they collect leaves, small sticks, 

 etc., and sit very close. I have on several occasions seen them in their 

 nests, but, as I refrained from disturbing them, they did not offer to 

 move, though they could not fail to know that they were discovered. 

 They usually sit on about a dozen or fifteen eggs. They are generally 

 hatched about the beginning of November ; and from January to the 

 end of March, when the corn is standing, are remarkably juicy and 

 tender. When the dry season comes on the birds feed on the seeds 

 of weeds and insects, and their flesh becomes dry and muscular. 



The train of the male Peacock, although popularly called its tail, is 

 in reality composed of the upper tail-coverts, which are enormously 

 lengthened and finished at their extremities with broad rounded webs 

 or with spear-shaped ends. The shafts of these feathers are almost 

 bare of web for some fourteen or fifteen inches of their length, and 

 then throw out a number of long loose vanes of a light coppery green. 

 These are very brittle, and apt to snap off at different lengths. In the 

 central feathers the extremity is modified into a wide, flattened, battle- 

 door-shaped form, each barbule being colored with refulgent emerald- 

 green, deep violet-purple, greenish bronze, gold, and blue, in such a man- 

 ner as to form a distinct " eye," the centre being violet of two shades 

 surrounded with emerald, and the other tints being arranged concen- 

 trically around it. In the feathers that edge the train there is no " eye," 

 the feathers coming to a point at the extremity, and having rather wide 

 but loose emerald-green barbules on its outer web and a few scattered 

 coppery barbules in the place of the inner web. The tail-feathers are 

 only seven or eight inches in length, are of a grayish-brown color, and 

 can be seen when the train is erected, that being their appointed task. 



The Pheasants come next in order, and the grandest and most im- 

 posing of this group, although there are many others that surpass 

 its brilliant coloring, is the Argus Pheasant, so called in remem- 

 brance of the ill-fated Argus of mythology, whose hundred eyes 

 never slept simultaneously until charmed by the magic lyre of Mer- 

 cury. 



This magnificent bird is remarkable for the very great length of its 

 tail-feathers and the extraordinary development of the secondary 

 feathers of the wings. While walking on the ground or sitting on a 

 bough the singular length of the feathers is not verv striking, but 

 when the bird spreads its wings, as shown in the figure," they come out 

 in all their beauty. As might be supposed from the general arrange- 

 raeut of the plumage, the bird is by no means a good flyer, and when 

 It takes to the air flies only for a short distance. In running its wings 

 are said to be efficient aids. 



