224 THE RED JUNGLE-FOWL. 



" Their principal food in the Sundarbans is insects, especially, 

 I should say, the larva of termites or white ants, which abound 

 there. Grass seeds also doubtless afford them some subsistence. 

 The majority rarely have an opportunity of feeding on grain — 

 only such few of them as chance to dwell near one of the 

 rare and isolated patches of cultivation 



' Rari nantes in gurgite vasto' 



ever see grain in these virgin wildernesses. It must, however, 

 be admitted that those which do thus get a chance of partaking 

 the luxuries of civilization evince the greatest partiality for 

 them, and regularly every morning and evening make a raid on 

 the rice fields near harvest time. 



" The best way of shooting these birds here is by proceeding 

 morning and evening along the edge of the forest between it 

 and the rice fields. The sportsman will thus flush two or three 

 coveys of them, and secure a few brace. The largest bag that 

 could be obtained by a single gun would hardly be more than 

 three or four brace. 



" Very few cultivators — there are no professional bird-catchers 

 in the Sundarbans — attempt to snare the Jungle-Fowl, and they 

 do so only occasionally. They catch them in nooses, using a 

 tame decoy bird to allure the wild ones. The decoy bird is 

 tethered in an open space close to the forest, with the nooses 

 placed round it and grain strewn about. The call of the 

 decoy bird — and it is always in a defiant tone — attracts the wild 

 fowl, and generally the males come forth to do battle and are 

 snared, or the hens to eat the grain, and are similarly secured. 

 I have never seen birds thus captured when mature, tamed or 

 even kept alive in confinement for any time, as they obstinately 

 refuse to eat, and pine away and die. 



" I may add that the Jungle-Fowls in the Sundarbans appear 

 to be descended immediately from domestic fowls, which used 

 to be let out there in considerable numbers by superstitious 

 wood-cutters to propitiate the sylvan deities — a practice still 

 prevailing to some extent — and I have shot these birds there 

 in different stages of transition. This is interesting, as we 

 evidently thus find the domestic fowl reverting to its pristine 

 condition, for the Red Jungle-Fowl is undoubtedly the origin of 

 our tame varieties of fowl. I had a couple of chicks, produced 

 from eggs of wild birds set under the domestic fowl, and they 

 remained contentedly in the poultry-yard, and freely bred — they 

 were both hens — with the tame fowl. The progeny were in 

 appearance midway between their parents, and exactly similar 

 to some I had shot in the Sundarbans. About that time the 

 cyclone of 1867 swept over the place I was residing at, and 

 of course put a premature end to the varied denizens of the 

 poultry-yard, hybrids included. I soon afterwards left my 

 abode in the wilds of the Sundarbans, and have had no 

 opportunity since of continuing the experiment." 



