311 



With regard to their habits, Mr. Hume says (Str. Feath. i. p. 222) that " they keep together 

 in flocks of from five to fifty ; very often each flock, at any rate in winter, consists of one sex, only 

 occasionally we found both sexes intermingled. They trot about on the dry soil picking up seeds 

 and insects, or squat motionless, sunning themselves in the early morning sun. They fly off to 

 drink, morning and evening, often to comparatively very distant localities, and in fact comport 

 themselves much as the other Rock-Grouse with which I am acquainted do. It was, perhaps, 

 due to the season being yet young, but it did strike me that, though I often watched them from 

 distances of from 80 to 100 yards with my binoculars, I never saw that perpetual skirmishing 

 going on among the males which I have so often noticed amongst those of P. arenarius (but, no 

 doubt, later in the year) in the Punjab." 



Mr. J. I. S. Whitaker informs me that he found it frequenting, like other Sand-Grouse, 

 open stony places and sand-hillocks, where the colour of the soil and the surroundings harmonize 

 so perfectly with that of its plumage as to render detection at a distance next to impossible. It 

 is, he adds, a shy, wary bird, and when in large flocks is almost unapproachable. He never 

 succeeded in finding its nest. 



Dr. Newman describes the note as peculiar, sounding like Quiddle, quiddle, quiddle, some- 

 what resembling the gurgling note produced by blowing through a reed, one end of which is 

 immersed in water. Like its congeners it deposits its eggs on the ground, the nest being a 

 mere depression. 



Mr. A. O. Hume (Nests & Eggs of Ind. B. 2nd ed. iii. p. 366) says that he received a single 

 egg, extracted from the body of a female shot in the desert west of Shikapoor, Upper Sind, on 

 the 20th March, 1875, which in shape and size was similar to the egg of P. ewustus, but the 

 markings were much more sparse than in any egg of that species he had ever seen. It is 

 cylindro-ovoidal, the ground-colour pale yellowish stone-colour, and the markings, which are 

 thinly distributed over the surface of the egg, consist of olive-brown spots and tiny blotches, 

 with a few crooked and hooked lines ; besides these a few pale lilac-purplish or inky-grey spots, 

 streaks, and smears, having a subsurface appearance, are scattered irregularly about the surface 

 of the egg. Canon Tristram (/. c.) describes the egg as having the ground-colour similar to that 

 of P. alchata, but the brown spots are very faint, and it is scarcely more than half the size of the 

 egg of that species. He only succeeded in finding a single nest in the Sahara. 



The specimens figured are the male and female above described, axtd are in my own 

 collection. 



In the preparation of the above article I have examined, besides the series in the British 

 Museum, the following specimens : — 



E Mus. H. M. Dresser, 

 a, <J ad., b, $ ad. Sind {Lieut. H. E. Barnes), c, g juv., d, g ad. Kotri, Sind, June 1893 (G. M c 'Mullen). 



E Mus. H. B. Tristram. 



a, g. Wady-er-R'mail, Judaea, February 1st, 1864 {H. B. T.). b, £ . Ziza, Moab, February 27th, 1872 

 {H. B. T.). c, ? . Kustul Belka, Moab, February 27th, 1872 {H. B. T.). d, $ . The Nile {E. Cavendish 

 Taylor) . 



2u2 



