THE GAME BIRDS OF INDIA, BURMA AND CEYLON. 401 



long, yet in half an hour's bustlmg we got but one bird, and that I 

 shot as he raced across a strip of open to another patch. Three or 

 four times a bird would come out a foot or two into the open and 

 then doiible back as one of the dogs came rushing past it. 



Although such a little skulker, the Bustard Quail by no means 

 shuns humanity or human habitation, and is often found in gardens 

 of bungalows, scraps or bush and grass round about, and even in 

 the middle of villages. They are common in tea gardens, and feed 

 continually within very short distances of women plucking tea, or 

 men hoeing the ground between the bushes. In many parts of 

 India they seem to be peculiarly partial to the borders of rough 

 grass growing at the edges of tanks, and to the softer grass in 

 Mango topes or orchards. In Sylhet and Oachar I also often found 

 them in small strips of dry grass land surrounded on all sides by 

 water and swamp, and we often added one or two to our bag when 

 out snipe shooting by making a man beat the small pieces of high 

 grass land dotted about here and there in amongst the rice fields. 



It is an excellent article of diet, and Bustard Quail on toast,. 

 though a much smaller, is quite as excellent a morsel as any real 

 Quail. 



In this species, as in all others of the genus, the female bird is 

 the one which " wears the breeks " in their family arrangements,. 

 and it is she who fights for the male whom, when fought for and 

 won, she completely dominates and henpecks. In a wild state, the 

 hen bird attracts the male to her with a loud booming call, 

 generally described as a purr or as a cross between a purr and a coo. 

 Dr. Seth Smith writes of their call : 



" The call note uttered by the Hemipodes seems to be much 

 the same with all, — a soft booming, which is more or less 

 ventriloquial. The female utters the note far more frequently 

 than the male, and I am not sure that he calls at all, but I 

 believe he does occasionally. This note may be almost called a 

 ' Coo ' ; I have frequently mistaken it for the coo of the Bronze- 

 winged Pigeon in the distance. Some writers have likened 

 it to the distant bellowing of a bull, and the Mediterranean 

 form, T. sylvatica, is known as ' Torilla ' or ' little bull '. " 

 The sound is also not unlike the deep gaittural purr, or grunt of 

 a tiger, and sometimes, when hurrying along a lonely jungle path as 

 evening was coming on, it would give one quite a start to hear the 

 call come soft and deep from just behind. On moonlight nights the 

 female birds call incessantly during the breeding season, and in the 

 stillness and darkness their voices sound extraordinarily loud. I 

 think the bird often mounts on any convenient hillock to " boom ", 

 but she never gets on to a stump or branch. Her attitude when 

 calling is crouched rather low on the ground with her wings out- 

 spread on either side and gently quivering. 

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