THE WHITE-CRESTED KALIJ. 1 79 



patches of cultivation, old cowsheds and the like, coppices 

 near villages and roads, and, in fact, forests and jungle of 

 every kind, except the distant and remoter woods, in which 

 it is seldom found. The presence of man, or some trace that 

 he has once been a dweller in the spot, seems, as it were, 

 necessary to its existence. 



" The Kalij is not very gregarious. Three or four are 

 often found together, and ten or a dozen may sometimes be 

 put out of one small coppice ; but they seem in a great 

 measure independent of each other, and much like our Eng- 

 lish Pheasants. When disturbed, if feeding or on the move, 

 they generally run, and do not often get up, unless surprised 

 suddenly and closely or forced by dogs, and lie rather close 

 in thick cover. 



" They are never very shy, and, where not unceasingly 

 annoyed by sportsmen or shikaris, are as tame as any 

 sportsman could wish. In walking up a ravine or hill-side, 

 if put up by dogs a little distance above, they will often fly 

 into the trees close above his head, and two or three allow 

 themselves to be quietly knocked over in succession. When 

 flushed from any place where they have sheltered, whether on 

 the ground or aloft, they fly off to some distant cover, and 

 alight on the ground in preference to the trees. 



" Their call is a loud whistling chuckle or chirrup ; it may 

 occasionally be heard from the midst of some thicket or 

 coppice at any hour of the day, but is not of very frequent 

 occurrence. It is generally uttered when the bird rises, and, 

 if it flies into a tree near, often continued some time. When 

 flushed by a cat or a small animal, this chuckling is always 

 loud and earnest. 



" The Kalij is very pugnacious, and the males have fre- 

 quent battles. On one occasion I had shot a male, which lay 

 fluttering on the ground in its death struggles, when another 

 rushed out of the jungle and attacked it with the greatest 

 fury, though I was standing reloading the gun close by. The 

 male often makes a singular drumming noise with its wings, 

 not unlike the sound produced by shaking in the air a stiff 

 piece of cloth. It is heard only in the pairing season ; but 

 whether to attract the attention of the females or in defiance 

 of his fellows I cannot say, as I have never seen the bird in the 

 act, though often led to the spot where they were by the sound." 



This is certainly not to attract the females, but solely as a 

 defiance. If you peg out a tame male of the allied vermi- 

 cellated Pheasant in the breeding season, as is commonly done 

 in Burma, surrounding him with snares, and then set your 

 male drumming, by imitating the sound with a piece of stiff 

 cloth, male after male replies, rushes in at your bird and gets 

 caught in the snares, but no female ever puts in an appearance 

 or is ever thus snared, 



