THE GAME BIRDS OF INDIA, BURMA AND CEYLON. 196 



February and I have once seen them in May. They appear to have 

 no special hour for drinking, and are not at all shy, so it is possible 

 to walk up within gunshot distance when they are feeding on the 

 bare plains. On being fired at a flock will only fly a hundred yards 

 or so and will allow another shot to be taken in the same manner. 

 In this way a flock could easily be exterminated, as they do not 

 seem to get any wilder. I have seen them at Kambazong and at 

 various places in the Brahmapootra Valley, West of Shigatse. I 

 made every effort to get the eggs of this bird but without success." 



There is practically nothing on record about the breeding of this 

 fine Sand-Grouse, but Gates writes as follows about two eggs now 

 in the British Museum Collection. " These two eggs were found by 



Mr. St. George Littledale, and although they have no further 



history, doubtless belong to this species. These eggs are perfectly 

 elliptical, rather glossj'^ and measure, the one 1-9 x 1'37 and the 

 other 2 X 1-83. They are of a light stone colour with a number 

 of pale purple shell marks and numerous surface dots and marks 

 of reddish brown, evenl3T distributed over the egg." 



Beyond the above eggs the only others are those mentioned by 

 Colonel Ward and some others in my own collection. Colonel 

 Ward writes {in loc cit) : " The Tibetan Sand-Grouse is 

 found in flocks in Tibet and eggs were taken by Captain W. Leslie 

 on the Eastern borders of that district on the 22nd, 23rd and 2-5th 

 June." 



One of these eggs which Colonel Ward gave to Dr. H. N. 

 Coltart is now, through the latter's generosity, in my collection, 

 and agrees well with a clutch of three eggs received from Sikhim 

 and two others, one of three and one of two sent to me from Tibet. 

 Those from Sikhim have no data with them except that they were got 

 from a high plateau in the North-East of Sikhim by villagers in the 

 month of June ; those from Tibet were taken near the Chamb 

 Valley on the 16th and 18th June. They are said to be common to 

 in many parts of Tibet, and very common in some, but I have failed 

 to get any more eggs, though Capts. F, M. Bailey, E. S. Kennedy. 

 D, Macdonald and L. Weir have all collected for me very fine series 

 of eggs of many extremely rare species. 



All these eggs in my collection with the exception of Col. Ward's, 

 resemble one another very closely and are exactly like the eggs 

 Syrrphates paradoxus in the British Museum. The ground colour 

 is a pale stone colour, in some being of a rather warmer tint more 

 a creamy buff and the markings consist of spots, specks, and 

 blotches, the last predominating, of brown, some yellowish, some 

 reddish, the two tints varying in different specimens. The 

 secondary marks are of the same character and in colour a washj:- 

 purple grey or lavender grey, here and there being one of a rather 

 deeper purple. The eggs have a fair gloss, in one clutch a rather 



