VICINITY OF KHANDALA, &c. 251 
fields for rice and ndchni (Hleusine coracana). The ground in 
most places is rocky, and the soil thin. So that the trees are 
mostly small and dwarfed. But as a large space is wooded, 
the fruits, seeds, insects, &c.,on which certain kinds of birds 
feed, are produced abundantly. Of these birds we may men- 
tion the Spurfowl (Calloperdix spadiceus), the Bulbul (Oto- 
compsa fuscicaudata), the Black Bird (Merula nigropileus), the 
Ground Thrush (Geocichla cyanotus), the Whistler (Myiophonus 
Horsfieldii), and the Merry Wrenbabblers (Alcippe poiocephala 
and Pellorneum ruficeps). These birds have greatly increased 
in numbers within a few years. ‘The preservation of the trees 
on this tract has not however increased the number of kinds 
of birds on the Mahabaleshwar plateau so much as might have 
been expected. The birds that affect the groves and wooded 
ravines of the western declivities, and the western base of the 
hills, are mostly, if not all, found also in similar situations near 
Khandala, although Khandala is a degree farther north, and 
seems to have been regarded by Dr. Jerdon as fairly outside 
of the Malabar region. 
The western face of the Sahyadris is very precipitous, and 
there are belts of bare rock running along almost continuously 
for hundreds of miles. In some places these are crossed by 
ravines that are wooded fairly up to the crest of the hills. 
Other strata of the trap rock. of which these hills are composed, 
are friable, and in them some trees find congenial soil. So belts 
of small trees run along the hill sides horizontally at different 
heights, and both beautify and utilize them. Barbets, Orioles, 
Woodpeckers, Babblers, Thrushes, Bush-quails, Spurfowls, Green- 
pigeons, Shrikes, Honeysuckers, Bulbuls, Cuckoos, &c., frequent 
these belts of trees. Some of them come down from the 
higher woods, and some come up from the valleys. The birds 
that belong distinctively to the Malabar region, seem more at 
home in the wooded valleys which are but little higher than 
the rest of the Konkan. They sometimes ascend the hill sides 
for food, but the crest of the hills is a boundary they seldom 
pass. Some of the Babblers as (Alcippe poiocephala, Pyc- 
torhis sinensis, and Dumetia albogularis,) one of the Barbets, 
(Megalaema viridis,) our Hill Lark (Alauda malabarica), and the 
Ghat Black Bulbul (Hypsipetes ganeesa) live mostly on or near 
the top of the hills. They are seldom found far down the 
western slopes and do not often wander into the dry open plains 
of the Dakhan. There are limited localities however on and 
among the spurs which extend from the Sahyadri mountains 
far into the Dakhan, that are congenial to the birds which 
frequent the slopes of the Sahyadris, and I have found Mag- 
pies (Dendrocitia rufa), Sirkeers (Zaccocua affinis), and Thrushes 
