CAME BIRDS 
The expert studies details of the skeleton : he is particularly 
interested in the bones iu the roof of the mouth, the 
manner in which the intestines are coiled and a hundred 
and one other points, but such things do not concern us here 
and throughout this book wc wtU confine ourselves to those 
features which can be most easily verilied hy any reader, more 
especially iu the field rather than in the laboratory or museum. 
In size game-birds vary to a great extent, ranging- from 
species of quail as small as sparrows to the lordly peafowl 
and the rotund turkey. Many of the pheasant-like game-birds 
{Phasianidac) are remarkabje for their beauty: notably the 
gorgeous hues of the peacock, the fascinating eye-spots on the 
shaded feathers of the argus-pheasant a*id the rich reds and 
metallic blues of the **firebacks*'. 
They are found almost all over the world although a few 
families are restricted to certain well-defined areas. Thus it is 
that we meet with g^rouse in the north only of both the Old 
and New Worlds and the ctirassows are confined to America, 
Owing' to their terrestrial habits most game-birds are easily 
domesticated and the fact that the domestic fowls of the British 
sles are derived from ancestral wild game-birds is compara- 
vely well-known. It is not so yrenerally recognized that the 
red jungle-fowl, the "ayanvutan'' of the Malays and a common 
bird in the Malay Peninsula, is regarded as the progenitor of 
the farmyard fowl. In the Federated Malay States the wild 
rooster frequently strays to outskirts of the kantpontja where 
he mates with the domestic hens. The true Mala^^an domestic 
fowls are extremely similar to their wild coushis. 
It is natural that Europeans should associate game-birds 
with the sporting proclivities displayed by the pheasants, grouse 
and partridges of the home counties and the totally different 
habits exhibited by the local species tends to produce the im- 
pression that ^^ame-birds are absent from Malaya. Most of 
the species found in the Malay Peninsula are wily birds, very 
capable of looking after themselves. Their skulking, retiring 
habits and their extreme reluctance to take wing makes them 
contrast very stronf^Iy with the foolish partridges of the stubble 
fields, the semi-domesticated pheasants of the coverts and the 
simple grouse that fly back straight over the guns. 
[29] 
