102 IXitlAX DICKS. 



Often wlieii wo a[)}iro;iclie(l >oiii(' piece ot" water, where the ree(l> and 

 rushes ^rew so rank that we ;;ot ri;;ht in before we fired, the A\'hi^th'rs 

 would rise at the shot in masses before us, ahnost carrying out that old 

 figure of speech " darkcninn; the air." I was greatly struck on these 

 occasions by the attitudes of the birds, which reminded me much of 

 ancient piints on duck-shooting, the birds with their h)ng necks out- 

 stretched rising straight up for some lieight imtil they got fairly started, 

 when they fly off' parallel with the water, generally about IjO or 40 feet up, 

 and not ver}- fast in spite of their noisy flight. Hume, Legge, and many 

 others have mentioned the rapidity with which they beat their wings, and 

 have also noted the smnllnessof the result when compared with the amount 

 of exertion used. When found in small flocks, that is to say, up to about 

 fifty or so, on tanks, ponds, and small ])ieces of water, they often fly round 

 and round the place before leaving it, and more particularly is this the 

 case when, there l)eing no other water very close l)y, they are loath to ([uit 

 the piece from which they have been roused. In the va<t pieces of water 

 in the delta of the Ganges I did not notice tlii- habit >o much. When 

 first disturbed, and the Ijirds get n\i all at once, it would seem that they 

 form a flock numbering some thousands ; but they soon divide into smaller 

 ones, seldom numbering over two or three hundred, and then with a 

 preliminary Avheel or two fl}- off to some other part of the swamp. \\'\\y 

 they should be so wild in the Sunderbands and yet so tame in most parts 

 of their habitat, I cannot explain. The}- are not much shot at, as the 

 inhabitants are nearly all fisher-jjeople, who ]tossess but few guns, and who 

 get their duck by driving them into nets and not by shooting them. 



I have never, in any part of Bengal, known them to lie so tame as to 

 require stoning to induce them to leave a tree, as Hume says is necessarv 

 in many parts ; yet in Rnngpur, Furreedpur, and some other districts they 

 are so confiding that to get a sitting shot would be a veiy easy feat were it 

 desirable, and the birds do not fly mitil the last moment. They jierch vei'v 

 freely on trees, even during the non-ljreeding season, but I thiidc that, as a 

 rule, they rest, when in flocks, on the water and not on trees, though 

 sometimes, of course, they do rest during tlie heat of the day on trees. 

 Hume, indeed, says they generally rest thus, and this habit again may be 

 one of locality, varj-ing in the different parts it affects. 



At night I think they roost almost invariably on trees, and even wh(>re 

 they arc shy and wild, and feed in the evening and early morning, the 

 middle of the night is jn-obably passed roosting on tree-. They vei-y rarely 

 rest on land, as do their larger brethren, J), fnlra, and 1 have never 



