Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v3.c43.t1.6

v3.c43.t1.6

February 2.—An accident has compelled another halt at Morwan. The morning was clear and frosty, not a cloud in the sky, and we rose with the sun; my kinsman, Captain Waugh, to try his Arab at a nilgae, and myself to bag a few of the large rock-pigeons which are numerous about Morwan. My friend, after a hard run, had drawn blood from the elk, and was on the point of spearing him effectually just as he attained a thick part of the jungle, which not heeding, horse and rider came in contact with a tree, and were dashed with violence to the ground. There he lay insensible, and was brought home upon a charpai, or cot, by the villagers, much bruised, but fortunately with no broken bones. A leech was not to be had in any of the adjacent villages; and the patient complaining chiefly of the hip-bone, we could only apply emollients and recommend repose. I returned with no game except one or two black-partridges and batten-quail. The rock-pigeon, or *barr-titar*, though unaccustomed to the fowler, were too wild for me to get a shot at them. The bird bears no analogy to the pigeon, but has all the rich game plumage of the *titar*, or partridge, in which name the ornithologist of the west will see the origin of *tetra*. There are two species of this bird in India, one much smaller than the common partridge; that of which I speak is much larger, and with the peculiarity of being feathered to the toe. I have since discovered it to be the counterpart of a bird in the museum at Chambéry, called ‘*barteveldt des Alpes*’; the ptarmigan of the highlands of Scotland. The male has exactly these redundant white feathers; while that I saw in Savoy was a richly plumaged female *barr-titar*.