485 
1862.] Notes of a trip from Simla to the Spiti Valley. 
every year in winter time, as proved by the number of horns which 
ornament the piles of stones near many of the villages. In Spiti 
the Burrel horns are common, but I only noticed horns of the Ibex 
in the Peen valley. 
One reason perhaps of my meeting with no game, was from my 
not going after it, and rarely halting in the same place two consecu¬ 
tive days. Yet traversing unfrequented mountains as I did, without 
by chance meeting anything, proves the great scarcity of animals, and 
similar complaints I have heard made by others. The best shooting 
in fact about Simla may be had along the road. Pheasants being 
plentiful and Chakor also all the way to Saraon, the farthest Bun¬ 
galow as yet completed ; five sorts in all being procurable, viz., 1st, the 
Monal, Lophophorus Impeyanus , Latham ; 2nd, the Argus, Ceriornis 
melanocepJiala, Gray ; 3rd, the Koklas, Puclirasia Macrolopha , Lesson ; 
4th, Kalij, JEuplocomus alhocristatus, Vigors; and 5th, the Cheer, 
Fhasianus JVallichii, Hardwicke, the last only being a true phea¬ 
sant, and perhaps the least attractive of the lot. No painting can 
do justice to the gorgeous beauty of the Monal, the cock of which 
is resplendent with burnished azure with a golden irridescence, such 
as the bird of Juno can only rival in the Old World, or those winged 
gems, the true humming birds, surpass in the New. A handsomer bird, 
however, in my opinion is the cock Argus with, when living, its 
superbly coloured gular sack and head lappets and the beautiful con¬ 
trast which its white spots of unsullied purity form with the rich 
warm tints of the body plumage. The koklas and kalij are both 
also eminently handsome birds, that is the cocks in their spring 
plumage ; the hens of all being more sombre-coloured and less attrac¬ 
tive.* 
No person starting for the interior should omit a few articles to 
enable him to preserve any object of interest he may meet with, such 
as a pot of arsenical soap, four or five broad mouthed stone jars filled 
with spirits of wine and well corked (good corks are far preferable to 
glass stoppers) to receive snakes, bats, &c., and a few small glass 
# Any person desirous of procuring skins or other objects of Natural History, 
can do so by addressing A. P. Begbie, Esq., Simla, as that gentleman has many 
Shikarries always employed in collecting and preparing skins. A case containing 
good skins of all the above pheasants and also skins of the snow pheasant, 
Tetraogallus Himalaganus, Chakor, Cacabis chakor , and the black partridge, 
Francolinus vulgaris , in all 24 skins, will cost eighty rupees, a price which those 
who know the expense attending collections, will not consider excessive. 
