REVIEW. 
1115 
Siberia and Mongolia to Japan and Northern China. A small matter, then ; but 
anyone who can teU just how and why these three forms arose, so nearly alike, 
will have in his hands the whole secret of the origin and distribution of species. 
Of illustrations, this volume, as compared with the earher publication, contains 
plates of the heads of two additional kinds of swan, and certain less formal photo- 
graphs of the bieeding-groimd of the bar-headed goose in Tibet. And here, 
again, is a problem. Why does the bar-headed goose, which comes down at 
other seasons to the more comfortable latitudes of a large part of India, choose 
to nest and rear its yoimg at a height of nearly 15,000 feet above the sea, and 
probably much higher ? The natural suggestion is that it retires into the remote 
sohtudes for the safety of isolation. Isolation from what ? For when the habits 
of geese wei’e fonned they can hardly have had to guard against the enmity 
of man. The commonly accepted assumption is, moreover, that the breeding- 
ground of a species is its original habitat. Did the bar-headed geese, then, 
originate on the Himalayan heights in some far-distant past, when climatic 
conditions were other than they are to-day ; and was it the increasing cold which, 
making their homeland foodless in winter, drove them down to the lower levels 
in search of sustenance, only to return each spring to their native haunts when 
the iron grip of winter was removed ? This, or something like it, is probably 
the cause which lies at the root of all migration. But it helps us but a httle 
way towards an imdeistanding of the marvel of migration as a whole. 
It is in the second volume, however, that English readers will find the greater 
fascination ; for here — besides the snipes and woodcock— are the birds more 
characteristic of the gorgeous East, all delightfully pictirred by Mr. Gronvold : 
the bustards, of which, including the houbara and the floricans, there are six 
species, and eight kinds of the lovely dove-’ike sand grouse. The Imperial Sand 
Grouse was one of the birds with which the Prince of Wales had good sport on 
his recent Indian tour. It is a tricky and difficult bird to shoot, coming in in 
flocks (it is usually shot from butts as it comes to water in the early morning), 
travelling at a disconcertingly high speed, with a knack of ducking— dropping, 
almost perpendicularly, like a stone — as soon as it catches sight of the gunner. 
As to the abundance of the birds at the right places, Mr. Stuart Baker quotes 
Hume’s statement that in the course of a fifteen-mile drive he saw over one 
himdred packs of grouse, the packs varying in size from four or five birds to 
nearly a thousand. A more recent and exact record, however, is now furnished 
by the records of the Prince and his party at Gujner Lake, as compiled by the 
Maharaja of Bikaner. On the preceding morning (December 4, 1921) the Maha- 
raja’s markers had reported that about 17,000 birds had come in to drink. On 
the two following days the party of 40 gims (of whom, however, a dozen at out- 
lying butts got but thirty birds among them) killed 1,946 birds, the largest 
individual bags being made by the Maharaja with 207 birds and H.R.H. with 
119, the latter being a good record for any man shooting at so evasive a bird for 
the first time. 
Apart from their sporting virtues, all the sand grouse are beautiful creatures. 
The Painted Sand Grouse, the Large Pintailed Sand Grouse, and the Tibetan Sand 
Grouse in particular, are even more beautiful than the Imperial race itself ; and 
in his paintings of them Sir. Gronvold has evidently dehghted in his subjects. 
As often in human efforts to describe the voices of birds, there is a curious dis- 
crepancy in the rendering by different observers of the Sand Grouse’s note. The 
Imperial’s note is, we are told, described by some writers as “ a clucking soxmd 
difficult to write down in words,” while others call it a “ soft double chuckle.” 
The Special Correspondent of The Times with the Prince of Wales, however, 
speaks of the air, as the birds came in, being full of “ the sweet purring whistle ” 
of their calls. 
In view of the ineffectual efforts that have been made to re-establish the Great 
Bustard as a resident of the British Isles, we caimot help being a little envious 
