THE CHUKOR. 39 



said to have been kept tame for fighting in former ages, as 

 game-cocks were, not so long ago, in England. Naumann says 

 that the inhabitants of Cyprus still (when he wrote) kept them 

 for this purpose ; and he remarks that history relates that the 

 Roman Emperor, Alexander Severus, was extremely fond of 

 this sport. The present species is very easily tamed ; and, ac- 

 cording to Turnefort, the inhabitants of Scio and other islands 

 of the Greek Archipelago keep tame Chukor Partridges, which 

 they allow to seek food in the fields like poultry. Baron 

 Konig Warthausen gives the following extract from the journal 

 of Samuel Kiechel, who travelled through almost the whole 

 of Europe between 1585 and 1589 : — ' In this island (Rhodes; 

 many Partridges are kept, some peasants having as many as 

 400 or 500, more or less. They breed, and are as tame as Geese. 

 In the morning a boy or girl drives them out into the fields, 

 and they fly away and search for food during the day. Towards 

 evening the child goes out in search of them ; and when they 

 hear the child's call, they fly towards him or her and are led 

 back to the house of their owner." 



I have already noticed that birds once flushed lie well and 

 seem unwilling to rise again after a good flight In our " Lahore 

 to Yarkand" Dr. Henderson noted that "in Yarkand the Chukor 

 swarms (wherever the rivers debouch into the plains) over a belt 

 of country some ten or fifteen miles in width. The Yarkandis 

 disdain the use of firearms for the chase of these birds. A party 

 of men mounted on ponies and armed with whips pursue a covey, 

 and in a very short time succeed in capturing the whole flock. 

 The Chukor will never rise more than twice, and after that, as they 

 run, they are easily overtaken and knocked over with whips. This 

 sport is carried on over the most terribly rough ground in the 

 rocky valleys ; but the Yarkand ponies traverse, at the top of their 

 speed, country that most men would only crawl over with the 

 utmost caution and deliberation." 



Major O. St. John writes : — 



" This is the Common Partridge of Persia, and I have shot it at 

 all elevations, from 10,000 feet in the Elburz to the base of the 

 hills near Bushire. The race found in the south is, I think, deci- 

 dedly larger than that of the Elburz. In the wild moorland 

 country which fringes the oak forests of Fais, on the north, it is 

 especially abundant. I have killed twelve and a half brace before 

 breakfast in September near the Khan-i-Ziman caravanserai, 

 twenty-five miles west of Shiraz. Contrary to what is recorded 

 of its habits in the Himalayas, it avoids elevation in Persia." 



THE CHUKOR is in nowise migratory, though in some places 

 in the hills it may move a little higher and lower as the seasons 

 change. Wherever it occurs, there, as a rule, it breeds. 



It breeds from sea level, as on the Mekran coast, up to an 

 elevation of 16,000 feet in Tibet. Mr. Wilson took and sent 



