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It is common on the lower slopes of the Nilgiris, but does not often venture as high as Coonoor. A rich green bulbul-like bird with a golden forehead, a black chin and throat, and a patch of blue on the wing can be none other than this species. The true bulbuls are also classified among the Crateropodidæ.
Not so handsome as the moonal, being small and greyish in colour on the back, is the blood-pheasant, remarkable for its blood-red streaks on the breast and its blood-red under-tail-coverts. Bulbuls are largely represented and may be seen in large flocks among the scrub delightful, homely little birds with bright and cheery ways which specially attract us.
All was radiant: down below, the orange grove of our arrival rang with nightingales and bulbuls; there was a scent of heaven, an undertone of racing waters. Just as we were packed up to start, the khaylifa sent and expressed thanks for our medicine, and asked that as a favour we would see his wives, one of whom was ill.
It is seen in many bulbuls, robins, and woodpeckers, and in the pitta. The existence of these red under tail-coverts in such diverse species can, I think, be explained only on the hypothesis that there is an inherent tendency to variation in this direction in many species.
Mynas walked eagerly on the lawns looking for grasshoppers, glittering sunbirds hovered over the flowers, thrusting their slender bills into each nectar-laden blossom, bulbuls twittered among the mulberries and the koel made the shady banian tree resound with its melodious notes.
But we are wandering away from our black bulbuls. The hillmen call the Himalayan species the Ban Bakra, which means the jungle goat. Why it should be so named I have not an idea, unless it be because the bird habitually "plays the goat!" Black bulbuls seem never to descend to the ground; they keep almost entirely to the tops of lofty trees and so occur only in well-wooded parts of the hills.
Standing in the darkness of that vast desolate hall between the rows of those ancient pillars, I could hear the gurgle of fountains plashing on the marble floor, a strange tune on the guitar, the jingle of ornaments and the tinkle of anklets, the clang of bells tolling the hours, the distant note of nahabat, the din of the crystal pendants of chandeliers shaken by the breeze, the song of bulbuls from the cages in the corridors, the cackle of storks in the gardens, all creating round me a strange unearthly music.
Prince Fribble would have smiled, shrugged, drawled, "Eh, after all, the girl is handsome and deplorably cold-blooded!" Paul Vanderhoffen said, "I am not fit to live in the same world with her," and wrote many verses in the prevailing Oriental style rich in allusions to roses, and bulbuls, and gazelles, and peris, and minarets which he sold rather profitably.
The sound which it seems to produce more often than any other is very like the harsh anger-cry of the common myna. Many Himalayan birds have rather discordant notes, and in this respect these mountains do not compare favourably with the Nilgiris, where the blithe notes of the bulbuls are very pleasing to the ear. Jays are by nature bold birds.
The only other species of bulbul commonly seen in the hills is a very different bird. The bulbuls that we have been considering are inoffensive little birds which lead quiet and respectable lives. Not so the black bulbuls. These are aggressive, disreputable-looking creatures which go about in disorderly, rowdy gangs.
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