HIMALAYAN IMPEYAN PHEASANT 115 



the sky lacery of fir needles. I went directly to the spot from which he had risen, and 

 there found another tragedy — a cat-bear, whose fur of richest foxy-red was blowing 

 thistle-like over the moss. The great bird of prey had made two kills in quick 

 succession. Of one I robbed him, but the other I left as I found it. In the bewildering 

 turns of the wheel of life, one's sympathy knows not where to abide ; should I be 

 sorry for the splendid cock pheasant cut down in the full spring-time, or for the 

 harmless little cat-bear, upon which death swooped so suddenly while it was innocently 

 grubbing for roots ? or why not be glad for the appeased hunger of the helpless eaglets 

 in their distant eyrie? Thus passed my first day in the home of the splendid Impeyan 

 Pheasant. 



GENERAL DISTRIBUTION 



The Himalayan Impeyan may be said to occupy the entire Himalayan range of 

 mountains. It has been found in eastern Afghanistan, and thence eastward through 

 the north-west frontier provinces, Kashmir, Garhwal, Nepal, Sikhim, and for some 

 distance in western Bhutan, as far, indeed, as any reliable records have been obtained. 



If, however, we were to plot exactly the haunts of the Impeyan, we should find that 

 it would become restricted to more or less narrow, long and sinuous fingers reaching 

 here and there throughout the great chain of mountains, reflecting perfectly the high 

 altitudes. The average life zone of the Impeyan lies between six and thirteen thousand 

 feet. Stragglers have been shot after severe weather at four thousand five hundred, and 

 an old cock bird has been seen sunning himself on a lofty, outjutting point of rock at 

 nearly fifteen thousand feet elevation. With the snow cocks, blood partridges and 

 tragopans it shares these lofty mountains, these birds being the only members of their 

 family which exist at such altitudes. 



Not only does the Impeyan require an elevation of from one to three miles above 

 the sea, but it is typically an inmate of forests, more especially an open growth of 

 conifers. These necessities sharply delimit its distribution, shutting it off equally from 

 the low, hot Indian plains and the high, cold, but treeless Tibetan steppes. Within 

 these limits, however, it is widely distributed and may be flushed after the first foot- 

 hills have been passed, up to where, in the very innermost heart of the mountains, the 

 firs and rhododendrons have shrunk to shrubs before the all-pervading cold blasts. 



GENERAL HABITS 



Like almost all the feathered inhabitants of these high regions, the Impeyan is 

 decidedly migratory, in a purely altitudinal sense. In a word, the cold and snow force 

 him downward ; warmth and summer send him upward again au ciel. 



They are hardy birds, however, and no false alarm of winter frightens them. The 

 early snows may fall, and right thickly, without causing the Impeyans to shift their 

 autumn feeding grounds, but when a constant depth interferes with their grubbing 

 among the dead leaves, they wander slowly downward. At the lower elevations they 

 enter the zones of oaks, chestnuts and magnolias, and in such surroundings spend most 

 of the winter months. Occasionally a sheltered southerly slope will keep comparatively 

 free of snow throughout the cold season, and in such locations Impeyans may sometimes 

 be found at a considerably higher elevation than their usual winter haunts. Or again, a 



