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I am afraid I must wait for the cold weather. All my plays except "Chitra" were written in the winter. In that season lyrical fervour is apt to grow cold, and one gets the leisure to write drama. 31st May 1892. It is not yet five o'clock, but the light has dawned, there is a delightful breeze, and all the birds in the garden are awake and have started singing. The koel seems beside itself.
Reached Koel, or Allyghur, at eight A.M. Started again at five, stopping on the way to inspect the Jama Musjid, and a very fine old tower, probably of Buddhist or Jain origin, which was covered over with ancient inscriptions. Just as the Muezzin was calling to evening prayer, we again resumed our monotonous order of travel, and branched off towards Agra to visit the famous Taj Mahul.
Large-tailed Nightjar CAPRIMULGUS MACROURUS. Roller or Dollar-Bird EURYSTOMUS AUSTRALIS. Bee-eater MEROPS ORNATUS. Blue Kingfisher ALCYONE AZUREA. Little Kingfisher ALCYONE PUSILLA. Leach Kingfisher DACELO LEACHII. Sacred Kingfisher HALCYON SANCTUS. Mangrove Kingfisher HALYON SORDIDUS. Bronze Cuckoo CHALCOCOCCYX PLAGOSUS. Koel EUDYNAMIS CYANOCEPHALA. Channel-bill SCYTHROPS NOVAE HOLLANDIE. Coucal CENTROPUS PHASIANUS.
Among those birds of North Queensland jungles which have marked individualistic characters is that known as the koel cuckoo, which the blacks of some localities have named "calloo-calloo" a mimetic term imitative of the most frequent notes of the bird.
A Koel bird, as if in derision of the feathered songsters, sent forth his shrill plaintive, "Koe-e-el, Koe-e-el, Ko-e-e-el!" "Ah-a-a!" Barlow exclaimed in disgust "that's India; the fever-bird, the koel, harbinger of the hot-spell, of burning sun and stifling dust, and throbbing head." He cursed the koel, for the gentle mood had slipped from Elizabeth.
I would therefore attribute the presence of the koel at Almora and its absence from other hill stations to the fact that at Almora alone the koel's dupe occurs. The parrots are not strongly represented in the Himalayas. Only one species is commonly seen at the various hill stations. The cock, moreover, has a red patch on the shoulder.
Among the latter the most prominent are the grey-necked crow, the koel, the myna, the king-crow and the magpie-robin. In the spring paradise flycatchers are very abundant. From Almora the road to the snowy range runs over an almost treeless rocky mountain called Kalimat, which rises to a height of 6500 feet. From Kalimat the road descends to Takula 16 miles from Almora.
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 he of Koel is even more bold: "The consequences of the various revolutions which have taken place are sufficiently evident in an impoverished country and a declining population; the form of government which has existed has not operated to relieve the necessities of the subjects, or to improve the resources of this extensive empire, by the encouragement of husbandry and commerce; and military life has been embraced by a large body of the people.
The heat that is perceptible in the heads of elephants, the bitumen of mountains, the moss that floats on water, the slough of snakes, the sores that appear in the hoofs of bulls, the sterile tracts of earth that are full of saline matter, the dullness of vision of all animals, the diseases that appear in the throats of horses, the crests appearing on the heads of peacocks, the eye-disease of the koel, each of these was named Fever by the high-souled Mahadeva.
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