INDIAN PEAFOWL 173 



And correlated with this, when we do keep him in captivity we find that, like the cat, 

 he has caste ; he walks alone ; he accepts food and shelter, and in return remains in the 

 vicinity and displays his wonderful plumage. But he never degenerates, never becomes 

 a mere commercialized feathered thing, like his distant relatives — the poultry of the 

 barn-yard. His position in the scale of domestic creatures is equal to the cat ; some- 

 what ahead of the turkey. An instance of the remarkable sense of sight in birds even 

 when reared in captivity was brought to my notice in Ceylon. Many of the Singhalese 

 are expert stone-throwers. I have seen a man knock over one chicken after another, 

 but they are never able thus to kill a young Peafowl. When these are hatched under 

 a domestic hen, they become very wild after a few months, and must then be caught 

 or they will run off. No matter how swiftly or accurately a stone is hurled at them, 

 they dodge still more quickly. 



HOME LIFE 



A brief account of my first wild Indian Peafowl's nest will give not only a good 

 idea of the general environment, but also emphasize the shrewd mentality of this 

 species. One day in south Ceylon I started out at daybreak in a bullock cart. Civet 

 cats and junglefowl dashed across the road ahead, and the crows of the latter sounded 

 in all directions as we went along. After a two-hour ride in the springless cart, I came 

 within sight of a ford on the River Kirinda. As we halted at the top of the bank 

 several families of wandaroo monkeys came close and watched us intently. The trees 

 overhead were filled with brahminy kites, and bee-eaters dashed past in pairs. With 

 a rush we descended the bank, splashed through the river and pulled up the opposite 

 slope. Here I outspanned and breakfasted, and before I had finished, secured my 

 first Peahen, a bird which had finished nesting. 



A hot walk of two miles lay between me and the Peahen's nest, mostly through 

 jungle and paddy-fields. I climbed fences and passed most elaborate apparatus for 

 jangling kerosene tins and wriggling scarecrows. Slender poles led lines to a shelter 

 where a boy sat and pulled the cords — the tins at night, the scarecrows by day — to keep 

 Peafowl, deer and elephants from the grain. Slippery causeways covered with beautiful 

 flowers divided the paddy-swamps. Dense jungle alternated with these fields, tangles 

 of lianas, tall trees and palms. Along the margins iridescent kingfishers and sunbirds 

 darted about. In one reed-grown field a colony of a hundred or more golden-capped 

 weavers were in the height of their breeding season. In the distance water buffaloes 

 fed stolidly, attended by a white fringe of egrets. Twice I saw fresh elephant spoor. 



At last I entered the field where I had located the nest. Fifty yards away from 

 the edge of the jungle was a small clump of dense brush, about nine feet high and 

 twelve in diameter. At one edge of this, but well concealed within the cover, was the 

 nest, which contained a single egg. Pushing aside a tall growth of rushes, with spiky 

 heads several inches across, I could see the egg. There was no especial nesting 

 material, only a depression in the ground, a foot across and two inches deep in the 

 centre, with a few feathers and the dried leaves, twigs and other debris of the ground 

 as lining. The opening through which the bird entered was twelve or eighteen inches 

 above the ground and yet well below the top of the rushes, so that the Peahen must 



