TAINTED SAND-GROUSE. 11 



esteemed as a game-bird, and much sought after by many sports- 

 men, as well for the difficulty of clqse access, as for its qualities on 

 the table. It is stated that from the closeness and firmness of its 

 plumage, it takes a good gun and heavy shot to bring it down. 

 A writer records the great preponderance of one sex in every 

 flock, sometimes killing seven or eight females and not one male, 

 and vice versa. The flesh is mixed brown and white on the breast, 

 and though somewhat tough when fresh, and perhaps requiring to 

 be skinned, it is reckoned delicious eating ; indeed, one writer says 

 that it is the finest game bird for the table in India. Shooting 

 them from a hole dug in the ground near their drinking spots is 

 said to be a very deadly way of making a good bag, and this I 

 can readily believe. It is caught in the neighbourhood of 

 Pcshawur and other places in horse-hair nooses. 



This Sand-grouse is common in Afghanistan, where it is called 

 Tuturuh and Boora-hurra, or black breast, and in various other parts 

 of Central and Western Asia, particularly in Arabia, where it is seen 

 in flocks of millions, according to Col. Chesney ; also in Northern 

 Africa, and the South of Europe, especially in Spain, where it is 

 said to be tolerably abundant in winter, and to be often brought to 

 the market at Madrid. It breeds in Central Asia, and also in Africa 

 according to Tristram, and even in Spain. This last writer states 

 the rather strange facts that it chiefly feeds towards sunset, and 

 that it is almost domesticated in the Court-yards of the Arabs. 

 He also says that the flesh is white and dry. Can he be writing 

 of the same bird? 



2. Pterocles fasciatus, Scopoli. 



Tringa, apud Scopoli — Blyth, Cat. 1490— Gould, Birds 

 of Asia, pt. II. pi. 14— Jerdon, 111. Ind. Orn. pi. 10 and 36— P. 

 quadricinctus, apud Jerdon, Cat. 2,11— Hand eri. H. in the South 

 — Boot-bur, H. in the N. W. — Sunda polanka, Tel. 



The Painted Sand-grouse. 



Descr. — Male, general ground colour bright fulvous yellow, 

 the sides of the head, neck and breast, and shoulder of the wino-s 

 plain and unspotted ; the back, scapulars, ter dairies', and tail, banded 



