Mr. G. Damant now writes to me ;—
" This bird is found on most of the high ranges in the Ndga
Hills, notably on the Burrail range, near the villages of Kohima,
Khenomah and Mozemah.
" I t is a permanent resident, and does not appear to migrate.
" It is found on the highest peaks (which attain an altitude of
9,000 feet in the Burrail range) and probably never descends to
a lower elevation than 5,000 feet. It is said to breed in the
month of April, and to lay three or four eggs.
" During the cold weather it is found at lower elevations than
in the rains, as it descends as the mountain springs dry up.
" It appears to be generally distributed, but is not very
common. Two live examples, now in my possession, cat worms
and a kind of red berry very greedily. So far as I have
observed, it has only one note resembling the syllable ' ak.'
" The Na(jas catch these birds hv lavinrr a lin*> of ctiimt
According to notes furnished to me by Dr. Jerdon, recorded
from the type, an apparently adult male, before he skinned it,
the chin and upper portion of the throat and the orbital region,
which are bare, are yellow, here and there tinged greenish ; the
bill greenish horny; the legs and feet dull yellowish horny ; and
the irides pale brown.
Not improbably these colours may vary according to sex, age,
and season ; in the skin of a very fine male both lappets and
face appear to have been blue, and the legs and feet were certainly
red.
Dimensions of Adult Males from dried skins.—Length, 2ro to
23'0 ; wings, I0'25 to 1075 ; tarsus, 3-0 to 35 ; mid-toe, 2'3 to
25 ; its claw, straight, 08 to 09 ; spur, about 0'6 ; bill at front
from base of frontal plumes, I'O to 1*1 ; corneous portion only,
C55 ; from gape, 1*3 to i'4 ; from end of bare gular skin to tip
of lower mandible, 2'3 to 2'9.
One fine male before me has two spurs on the same level on
one leg. I presume this to be a purely accidental monstrosity.
The female is considerably smaller.
Length, l8'0 to 20'0 ; wing, 8-5 to 9-0 ; tarsus, 29 to 3-1 ;
mid-toe, 2-2; its claw, straight, 07; bill from frontal feathers
straight to point, 0*98 ; from gape, 1-4.
THE P L A T E . — A copy, I believe, of one of Mr. Wolffs, appears
to represent tolerably the adult male. The general tone, however,
of the mantle, rump and upper tail-coverts is not dark
enough, and the red that enters largely into the colouration of
these parts is really a rich maroon. I doubt also the correctness
of the colouration of the face and gular skin.
When our plate was prepared, the female, recently procured
for me, together with adult and young males, by Mr. G. Damant,
C.S., was still unknown, and it is necessary, therefore, to describe
her.
In the female, the ground of the entire mantle is black,
each feather very finely, almost microscopically, freckled, chiefly
along a broad central band with more or less rufous buff and
with one large, irregular zig-zaggy, somewhat arrowhead-shaped,
spot towards the tip ; in connection with this spot one or more
irregular wavy bars generally go off right and left towards, or to
the margins of feathers, which bars are often more ferruginous
than the rest of the markings : these spots arc most conspicuous
on the interscapulary region, and almost disappear on the rump
and upper tail-coverts, where the frecklings, on the other hand,
extend over nearly the whole feather ; the tail is blackish brown,
thickly set with irregular, mottled, wavy transverse bars of
ferruginous and ferruginous buff; the longest upper tail-coverts
partake of the deep ferruginous tint of the tail markings ; the
primaries and secondaries much like the tail, but the ground a
shade browner, and the markings less thickly set and nearly
confined to the outer webs ; the coverts and tertiaries partake
of the characters of the mantle, as do the head and back of
the neck, though in both these latter the markings are more
bar-like and much less conspicuous.
The chin and upper throat are greyish creamy ; the feathers
margined with greyish brown, and with traces of a spot of this
running in almost to the shaft, about half way up the feather ;
the rest of the front and sides of the neck and upper-breast
in much the same style as the back of the neck and mantle,
but the ground brown, the frecklings duller in colour and more
diffuse, and the spot only indicated.
The rest of the breast and the abdomen a sort of greyish
creamy, thickly set with freckly, imperfect bar-like brown
markings, having a tendency to mark out and define plain
patches or spots of the ground colour, towards the tips of the
feathers, analogous to the spots on the upper surface.