76 THE RUFOUS-THROATED HILL PARTRIDGE. 



preceding, of from 4,000 to 8,000 feet* in elevation. It is found 

 generally in coveys, and numbers are captured by the Lepchas 

 by calling them within shot, and taken into the station of 

 Darjeeling for sale. These birds frequent such dense cover that 

 shooting them in any other way is almost out of the question." 



Hodgson says that in Nepal this, the red-legged species 

 (which he was the first to discriminate under the name of rujifies, 

 though Blyth's name was first separately published), comes from 

 the lower hills, while torqueolus, while just extending into these, 

 comes chiefly from the central and upper regions. 



Again, Col. Tickell remarks : — 



" Nowhere does it climb so high as the black-throated species, 

 torqueolus, 6,000 feet being the limit of its range in the summer 

 season. In the cold weather I have come across it nearly at 

 the bottom of the valleys." 



Except that they keep lower down, and in more numerous 

 coveys, their habits are precisely like those of the common 

 species (torqueolus), as are their call notes, flight and food. 



In his account of the birds procured during the expedition 

 to the Daphla Hills, Major Godwin-Austen tells us that this was 

 the only species of Arboj icola obtained. " It was," he says, " very 

 common at 4,000 feet and upwards at our camp in the forest 

 under Toruputu Peak, and the Daphla guides snared several. 

 The Daphlas, like the other hill tribes, are clever at this art, and 

 the mode of capturing Pheasants and Partridges is simple and 

 worth describing. As it is the habit of these birds to get down 

 low at night into the warmer ravines, and feed upwards along 

 the crests of the spurs, they stop the progress of the covey 

 by a zig-zag barrier about two to three feet high, made up of 

 twigs and short pieces of bamboo stuck into the ground, which 

 is rapidly formed and extended a short distance down the hill 

 on either side. A narrow opening is left here and there, 

 generally at the re-entering angles, and in this the noose is 

 set, just above two cross sticks and in the same plane, at exactly 

 the height of the bird's breast. The noose string is made of a 

 thin strip peeled off the outside of a bamboo, and tied to the 

 end of a pliant stick, drawn down like a spring, and hitched 

 into a saw nick in a bamboo peg, into which the flat form of 

 the string forming the noose fits close and accurately. All the 

 materials grow on the spot, and in a few hours hundreds of 

 barriers and snares can be made and set. The birds are often 

 caught alive by the legs." 



Of the Tenasserim race, which is apparently far tamer than 

 the Himalayan one, Davison remarks in our " Birds of Ten- 

 asserim" : — 



" This species is very abundant about the higher slopes of 

 Mooleyit, keeping to the forest in small coveys of ten or twelve. 



* I presume in summer, but even at that season I have not seen it so high. — 

 A. O. H. 



