226 NOTES UPON A COLLECTION OF BIRDS MADS 



Beyond a certain point, I believe Barahath, it appears to be 

 devoid of fish, owing to the rapidity of the current, and perhaps 

 to its icy coldness. Here and there, and especially at Derali, 

 it opens out somewhat, and then we have broad shingle banks, 

 where a few Wagtails and other birds of aquatic habits are 

 found ; but these fine shingle beds ai'e sadly disfigured by huge 

 logs of timber. Some of these had been so long stranded and 

 were so rotten, that I was much tempted to cut iuto them for fire- 

 wood ; but I refrained, and sent my people to gather fuel where 

 they could. However, the stranded logs form convenient perches 

 for Motacilla Hodgsoni and Calolates melanope, to say nothing 

 of an occasional Actitis hypoleucos or Hyclrobata asiatica. Some- 

 times they were the favorite resort of Muticilla (?) fuliginosa 

 and Chcemorrornis leucocephala ; and thus the fiue old tree still 

 answered a useful purpose. The decaying logs too harboured 

 numerous insects, upon which these birds fed. 



Forty or fifty years hence, the last of the decomposing logs 

 will have disappeared, and the felled trees, left where they fell, 

 will also have vanished. The valley may again become to 

 some extent pleasant to visit, but the fine trees are gone, and 

 while the world lasts they will probably not be replaced ; 

 for in most instances the clearance has been too complete to 

 allow of trees being left to scatter seed. I saw no indications of 

 new ones being planted. 



The country is a very poor one, agriculturally considered. 

 Food is scarce, and very dear — dearer than any place I 

 know of. Could any one imagine the prevailing price of the 

 poorest description of meal, " Chooa-ka-atta," to be only six 

 seers for the rupee, wheatmeal 4 and 5 seers only ! Such a 

 thing as a fowl or an egg was not to be had after leaving 

 Mussoori. Beyond Derali, even milk is not to be ob- 

 tained, and for about a week I had none. Chooah-ka-atta is a 

 meal made from the seed of a sort of red " sag " or spinach.* 

 This I did not indulge in ; but my servants and coolies had 

 often the greatest difficulty in indticing the natives to sell them 

 even this miserable food. For my own use I took wheatmeal 

 with me from Mussoori. This my cook liberally invaded on his 

 own account, and had I prolonged my trip for another month, as I 

 originally intended, I too should have been thrown on spinach 

 meal as the " staff of life,'"' and such fare does not do for an 

 Englishman when he is walking from 12 to 20 miles per day, 

 to say nothing of digressions from the road after birds it is 



* This so called Spinach, the Anardana or Ramadana of tho natives, is the Amaran- 

 thus frumentaceus of Roxburgh. It is a Princes feather, and the Amaranthus speciosus 

 of gardeners is merely a variety of it. It is grown as a food crop, together with the 

 Batu (C/ienopodium album), throughout the bills, from elevatioDs of four to nine or ten 

 thousand feet. — Ed., S. F. 



