l6o . THE KOKLASS. 



Hill Partridges (A. torqiieola), four Chikore (of which I knocked 

 three over on the ground with one shot as they scuttled away) 

 on a bare grassy spur, on which a few fields had been, and 

 lastly a Barking Deer. 



With other Pheasants, except perhaps the Cheer, it has always 

 seemed to me so much more a matter of chance ; with Koklass, 

 if your men have marked them one day, you will find them 

 next day, at the same hour (for they move up and down the 

 hill a great deal during the day), in precisely the same spot, if 

 they have not been previously molested. The birds, though they 

 separate in all directions, do not go far, and do not run much 

 after they alight. 



And here I would remark that, unless you are a man of iron, 

 such as my old friend Wilson was, able to walk 40 or 50 miles up 

 and down without fatigue, and able to go up hill just as well 

 as down hill, it is all nonsense going Pheasant-shooting in the 

 Himalayas without the necessary aids and in the proper 

 manner. 



You must have good dogs (small cockers are best), thorough- 

 ly under control, who will work exactly to command, and obey 

 the whistle, and you must have a number of intelligent hill 

 men, something of sportsmen themselves, to search out the 

 shooting grounds, and when you are shooting, mark the birds 

 that get away from well-chosen posts. I used to have four 

 dogs and over a dozen men. 



Lastly, you must go in for small game as your object, and not 

 humbug after big game. If a Kakur jumps up in the grass 

 before you, roll him over with shot. Have a rifle along with 

 you, and if in beating a gloomy ravine for Hill Partridges an 

 old Sarrow, or a precipitous " dang" or cliff for Cheer, a Gooral 

 or two break, do your best with them, and if when hi^h up 

 after Moonal or Tragopan or Snow Cock, a Tahr or Burrel gives 

 a chance, by all means take it. But if you really want to make 

 bags of Pheasants and the like, you must make them your 

 object. Of course, too, you must get right away from hill stations 

 and avoid lines on which other people have been recently shoot- 

 ing, but the hills are so vast and so very few men even to this 

 day go in in earnest for small game, or can get leave in the 

 latter part of October and November, wilich is the real time 

 for Pheasants, that this is easy. 



I continually hear people abusing the shooting in the hills, 

 and declaring that it is impossible to get more than two or three 

 brace of birds in a day, but the fact simply is, that these sports- 

 men have not yet learnt their trade. Go to suitable localities, in 

 the proper season, with good dogs and men, and if you are a 

 fair walker and a fair shot, you may make as grand and varied 

 bags of Pheasants and Partridges of sorts, Woodcock, and solitary 

 Snipe in the Himalayas as in any place in the world where game 

 is not artificially protected ; and all the while you will be 



