LIST OF PHOTOGRAVURES xvii 



Photogravure 8. CHINESE HOME OF CABOT'S TRAGOPAN • Facing page 104 



Photograph by William Beebe. 



The distant Min River flows through Tragopan country, whose mountain slopes are studded 

 with pine saplings and spots of gorgeous azaleas. The second-growth and tangled turf and dwarf 

 bamboos make rapid progress impossible for anything larger than a pheasant. 



Into this cleared space there dashed, without warning, a cock and hen Tragopan ; they 

 zigzagged back and forth, encircled the berry-covered tree and vanished into the scrub. The foliage 

 dripped, the fog soon shut tightly down, and to my ears came only the occasional whirring of the 

 moisture-laden wings of some passing small bird. 



Photogravure 9. EASTERN HIMALAYAN HAUNT OF THE IMPEYAN 



Photograph by William Beebe. Facing page 122 



At the climax of three mountain ranges in eastern Nepal, a mighty boulder juts out from the 

 steep slope. It is painted with lichens, encrusted with moss, and in a narrow shelf on its sheltered 

 side a trio of Impeyans roosted. This roosting place, at an altitude above the limit of trees, was 

 an isolated haven of safety, out of the reach of martens, foxes and wild dogs. The birds were 

 crowded close together on the thick, soft cushion formed by the alpine moss, and above them there 

 were the leaves of a tiny rhododendron which had found a foothold in a little crevice. Early in 

 the morning before the full sunlight would expose them to a passing eagle, the three would leap 

 outward and scale down for their morning drink at a snow-fed torrent. 



Photogravure id. WESTERN HIMALAYAN HOME OF THE IMPEYAN Facing page 130 

 Photograph by William Beebe. 



Two miles above the sea, in the coniferous forests of Garhwal. 



Between a jagged bit of rock and a sturdy deodar, I crouched early in the morning, every 

 needle and leaf about me drenched with dew. Behind were six ranges of mountains, dropping 

 away from the fathomless valley at my feet, and yet rising ever higher and higher to the distant 

 Tibetan snows. 



Before me was a glade surrounded by small trees, and having the appearance of recent 

 ploughing or of thorough trampling by the hoofs of a great herd of cattle. This was a feeding 

 ground of cock Impeyans, and within an hour on this particular morning fourteen fuU-plumaged 

 birds appeared. Wielding their beaks like picks, they dug deep holes and overturned clumps of 

 turf in their eager search for grubs and succulent tubers. Probably each had a mate somewhere 

 in the surrounding forests brooding her eggs, but each morning these birds, too gaudy to dare 

 to approach their nests, came here for a social meal, then separated to feed alone during the 

 remainder of the day. 



Photogravure ii. NEST AND EGGS OF THE IMPEYAN • • Facing page 136 



Photograph by William Beebe. 



At the base of an ancient, weather-beaten stub, half hidden in a mass of Himalayan ivy and 

 maidenhair fern, a hen Impeyan had made her nest. She would never have been revealed had not 

 a crested tit discovered and scolded her. In the cool air of these high Garhwalese forests, I watched 

 the bird day after day. During her brief absence, I photographed the two great spotted eggs. 

 The succeeding day I surprised a group of bander-log — the great grey Langur monkeys — and one 

 of them had stolen the spotted eggs and was climbing up a slanting tree-trunk. The lives of the 

 two young Impeyans were thus snuffed out ; the spring courtship, the battles of the cock, the care 

 on the part of the patient mother, all had been of no avail. 



Photogravure 12. YUNNAN HOME OF SCLATER'S IMPEYAN • Facing page 156 

 Photograph by William Beebe. 



The steep slope of sprouting bamboo was most terrible to climb. I made my way through the 

 shaded ravine running obliquely upward through the centre. On the way up, I found innumerable 

 traces of barking deer and Silver Pheasants, and I disturbed a king cobra from his den at the foot 

 of a wild banana. At the summit, beyond a tangle of caladiums and painted leaves, I encountered 

 the three Impeyans, the first wild birds ever seen by a white man. The full-plumaged cock was 

 scratching among the undergrowth shown in the lower photograph, and at my blind shot fell in the 

 same place. The others flew up a few feet beyond and scaled out of sight down the opposite slope. 



