river banks to drink, both morning and evening. At this time
of the year they are almost impossible to approach.
" When the crops have been reaped they grow less wild, and
may generally be found feeding in the stubbles in the early
morning from sunrise to 8 A.M., when they again take wing,
mostly soaring in large circles at a great height till evening. Their
favourite food, par excellence, in this district, is the ' karda' or
safRower oil seed {Carthamus tinctorius) which is sown in alternate
rows with linseed. They roost sometimes on bare, open
plains in a long single line, with sentinels posted on all sides,
and sometimes on the banks of large tanks, congregating in
vasts flocks by night, and separating into smaller parties of
from twenty to hundred birds as they go afield at early dawn.
" They are at all times very wary birds, and will seldom
allow a sportsman to get within eighty yards of them on open
ground. They can, however, sometimes be stalked when feeding
close to high standing crops. Cornstacks also afford occasional
ambushes. Walking by the side of a country cart or a
led horse is also a good plan; and like black buck they are
sometimes partially deceived by this innocent device. But
as I have found, by long experience, the best way to make
sure of a shot is to walk boldly up to the flock without concealment,
and immediately the first bird flaps his wings preparatory
to taking flight, to run as fast as ever you can, straight
at them. Cranes are very slow, indeed, in getting under weigh,
and if you have any breath left in you, after a short
spurt of sixty or seventy yards, you are almost certain of a shot at
the fag end of the flock within killing distance. I have practised
this myself systematically for years, and with almost invariable
success. A moderate turn of speed, and to know the exact moment
to stop, which is when you can get no nearer, is all that
is required. This plan, however, will not perhaps commend
itself to staid and elderly sportsmen of a corpulent habit, and
for such the country cart has its advantages.
" These Cranes are by far the most suspicious and un-getoverablc
birds in existence. The Phansi Pardis, who can circumvent
most birds with their gut nooses and cunning ways,
fail entirely when they think to catch a Demoiselle. I have
had a party of these ne'er-do-weels near my camp, for days
vainly trying to entrap a few of the thousands of Cranes which
daily congregated on the shores of a large irrigation reservoir ;
but not one bird was ever simple-minded enough to entrust its
leg within the fatal noose, however deftly concealed."
" The Cranes leave the district by the first week in March."
Mr. J. Davidson again says:—
" This bird is very common in the Sholapur and Sattara
Districts. It feeds morning and evening principally on
" kurda," a kind of oil seed sown in almost all the jowari
fields and which bears a bright yellow flower. In the middle of
the day they either rest on a sandbank in one of the larger
rivers or on the bank of a large tank. They are then very
difficult to approach from the shore, though oddly enough they
will allow a sailing vessel to pass quite near them. They arrive
about the beginning of November and leave in March.
" I never saw ' Kalam' either in Tumkur (Mysore) or in the
Panch Mahals."
In Upper India, the native fowlers capture and bring in
many, catching them sometimes in nets* as they do Geese and
other Water Fowl, and sometimes with snares, as in the case of
Bustard. I have never seen the birds caught, but have often
seen them carried about for sale. The fowlers sew the
eyelids together very lightly, and they will then allow themselves
to be carried about unresistingly, motionless, and as if mesmerized.
If fed and kept for some days in a dark place after
their eyelids have been unclosed, they soon become tame, and if
their wings are clipped, may be safely let loose. They will wander
about the garden, and sometimes associate with the poultry,
(always if there be Geese amongst these), and come back at
night to their cells as though they had been tame-bred fowl.
They seem very gentle, graceful beings, but like their namesakes,
are not always reliable, are very spiteful at times, especially
where any, that they consider rivals in your affections, children
or dogs, are concerned, and can scratch terribly when out
of temper.
Generally they seem to pine away during the hot weather,
but the Maharajah of Jeypore and other native princes have,
I know, succeeded in keeping them for many years. They
are, however, mostly kept by natives as quarries on which to
train Falcons.
No sort of sanctity attaches to these or the Common Crane
in Northern India, but in the south it would seem to be different.
* Mr. W. N. Chill writes from near Delhi :—
" The Demoiselle Crane is caught in the very same way as are the Bustard
and the large White and Common Crane, viz., in slip nooses made out of the ten.
dons obtained from the tarsi of large birds. These nooses, a caste of people known
here as Bavmyas, who catch both birds and animals, use most dexterously. On discovering
their game they choose a favourable spot, lay their nooses, which are attached
to little pegs which they drive into the ground, and then veer round towards the
birds outflanking them with the assistance of a buffalo, the best animal used for
this purpose. They approach closer and closer, then suddenly when coming very near
to the game, they hasten the pace of the buffalo, thus consequently forcing the birds
to walk faster. In their confusion some geneially entangle their feet in the nooses and
are thus captured :—
" The Demoiselle Crane (but not any of the other larger birds above enumerated)
is also netted by a caste called Kalbitts, real fowlers. These men, on observing
localities frequented by these birds, go and lay their nets there, taking great care
to cover them over with grass to prevent suspicion, and after scattering grain about
the ground that the nets will cover when sprung, go off and hide in some adjacent
spot, taking with them of course the strings of the nets. When the birds arrive as
usual, and finding, as they soon do, the giain, commence devouring it greedily, the
strings are pulled, the nets rise suddenly, and some of the birds get enclosed within
them, though many always escape."