294 BIRD BEHAVIOUR 



and straight; and the native tribes which inhabit 

 regions where these birds live use it as a head for 

 their spears. 



The Rheas fight with bill as well as feet, holding 

 on like bull-dogs, and bill- and foot-fighting is the 

 rule among the Game-birds ; every observer must 

 have seen how fighting cocks strive to get a hold 

 with the bill and with that purchase to deliver a 

 telling blow with the spurred legs. 



It is only among the Game-birds that spurs on the 

 leg occur at all, and they are generally single, and 

 normally confined to the male, as in the Fowl, Turkey, 

 and common Peacock ; but there are several groups 

 in which the cock has two or more spurs on each 

 leg, such as some of the African Francolin Part- 

 ridges (Pternistes) and the Asiatic Spur-Fowls 

 (Galloperdix) with two, the females of the latter 

 having one ; the Peacock-Pheasants (Polyplectron) and 

 Blood-Pheasants (Ithagenes) have variable numbers 

 in the male birds, in the common Himalayan 

 Blood-Pheasant the cock having up to four on 

 one leg and five on the other ; while I notice that 

 in three wild-bred and fully adult cock Grey 

 Peacock-Pheasants (P. chinquis) in the London Zoo 

 at present one bird has two spurs on each leg, one 

 one on one leg, and the third none, from which I 

 argue that such multiple spurs do not seem to be of 

 much use. Besides the hen Spur- Fowls, the hens 

 of the Crestless Pheasants (Acomus) and of the Javan 

 Pea- Fowl are spurred as well as the cocks. 



The long single spurs seen in the Fowl and some 



