I02 A MONOGRAPH OF THE PHEASANTS 



The best care possible was given to this, the first known living example of this 

 splendid bird. At night its cage was placed in a spacious stall, in the day it was 

 allowed the freedom of the Legation garden. But it showed little response to this 

 treatment, squatting immovable, taking food from the hand, both grain and insects, 

 but scarcely able to stand on its feet. It died after a few days from the wound 

 which it had received in being snared. 



A letter from M. Moquin-Tandon, director of the Botanical and Zoological 

 Gardens of Saigon, contains some interesting facts, at least concerning the haunts 

 of the Ocellated Pheasant, if not of the bird itself. It inhabits the mountainous 

 forests two hundred and fifty to three hundred kilometres west of Hue. There is a 

 large section of these mountains which is almost unknown, inhabited by tribes of 

 semi-savages who have little or no communication with the outside world. At long 

 intervals a Chinaman, bravely taking a desperate chance, traverses the lonely trails 

 which, few and far between, lead through the country. He risks everything for the 

 sake of exchanging packets of salt and tobacco, of needles and little knives, for 

 the powder of rhinoceros horn, for ivory and certain gums and resins to which the 

 Chinese attribute all sorts of virtues. If he is not robbed by those with whom he 

 came to trade, or if he is not eaten by some one of the numerous tigers which 

 abound, at last he returns to China with his gains, never, it is certain, desiring to 

 repeat his trip. This shows the difficulty of obtaining these birds in a country where 

 even the missionaries usually find it impossible to do more than reach the very 

 edge of this wild country. 



The only detailed account of this bird is a letter written by one P. Renaud, the 

 missionary who obtained the skin of the first Ocellated Pheasant for Rheinart. In the 

 main the facts seem to be reliable ; one or two notes, however, evidently obtained from 

 the natives, being most assuredly fiction. 



This pheasant is confined to the mountains which separate the Laos country from 

 Annam. It certainly occurs from the latitude of Qui-Nhon on the south, up to the 

 Gianh River on the north. It is unknown at Saigon, and in fact is absent from all the 

 low plains of southern Cochin China. In the west the travellers who have ascended the 

 Mekong make no mention of it. In the west it has never been observed in the lowlands 

 which stretch from the mountains to the sea. It is, however, not uncommon in even the 

 first dense forests which border the low country. 



For many years M. Renaud has heard, morning and evening, the call of the Ocel- 

 lated Pheasant ringing through the jungle. It prefers the quiet and lonely forests, 

 especially on the mountain-sides and their narrow valleys. It there haunts the dense 

 undergrowth, perhaps because the shade and dampness attract quantities of the insects 

 which chiefly compose its food. It is usually found in the vicinity of large trees in 

 which it roosts. Hence it chooses those with horizontal branches, affording easy 

 perches. On the ground it finds the crickets and other insects, and even little frogs, on 

 which it feeds. Renaud kept this species alive for two months with such food, 

 adding bananas, rice and maize, for which it showed little desire. 



A native of Annam hatched two young from two eggs which he placed under a hen, 

 and for several months they lived with the other inmates of the farm-yard, partaking of 

 the same food, worms, insects and various grains which they found for themselves by 



