NATURAL HISTORY AND SPORT IN THE HIMALAYAS. 323 
leaves, hair-like grass, &c., lined with thistle-down, and plastered 
outside with cobweb; and with scraps of tiny lichen, bits of 
decayed bark and wood, and two or three feathers here and there 
stuck on to set off the building; the entrance, an oval hole, was 
about half-way down; and there had been a shelf or portico over 
it, but the rain had somewhat disintegrated this portion of the 
beautiful little fabric. 
I shot a fine Wood Pigeon, C. Hodgsonii, on my way home, 
and observed several of them, but very shy. Capt. T. had gone 
out on a different beat, but had brought in nothing particularly 
noteworthy; his best spoils being a Zoothera monticola and a 
Yellow-naped Woodpecker, G. flavinucha, a female, which has the 
front of the neck pale chestnut in place of yellow, as in the male. 
A Ghoral, which started within a few yards of him, got away safe, 
as he was loading at the time, and he saw no other game of any 
sort. A paharee brought in for sale this evening sundry skins of 
Pheasants, but they were useless as specimens, from want of 
adequate ‘‘antiseptic treatment,” having only been rubbed over 
with solution of alum; but he had a good flat skin of the Pine 
Marten, M. flavigula, and a couple of the pretty Himalayan 
Weasel, Mustela subhemachalana, which I gladly purchased. The 
Weasel was new to my collection then, but I afterwards got 
several in the neighbourhood of Mussoorie. This man told me 
he had seen a pack of Wiid Dogs the day before, and engaged to 
shoot one for me; but I saw no more of him nor of the dogs. 
Fagoo, Oct. 5th. — We had a beat for game in the woods 
to-day, but our success was not brilliant, only five Kalij Pheasants 
after as many hours good hard toil. Capt. T. remained several 
hours longer, solus, and got another brace, and a Woodcock, a 
veritable Scolopax rusticola, an early arrival, and therefore un- 
looked for in the beginning of October. These woods seem 
designed for them, but I never saw a second from this part of 
the hills. North of Mussoorie they are not so rare, and from 
that locality I have also seen specimens of the Himalayan 
Solitary Snipe, G. solitaria, as I have of the Wood Snipe, 
G.nemoricola, from the country at the foot of the hills; but they 
are by no means common birds, any of them, and it is considered 
rather an event to bag one. 
I got a single specimen of the curious little Piculet (as Jerdon 
calls it), Picumnus innommatus, in the afternoon. As its name 
