Peacocks have been under domestication for many centuries and are mentioned in the Bible as having been imported into Palestine by Solomon; although the bird is referred to in mythology, the Greeks probably had but little knowledge of it until after the conquests of Alexander.
In the thick jungle only a few hundred yards from our camp on the Salween River I put up a silver pheasant (Euplocamus nycthemerus), one of the earliest known and most beautiful species of the family Phasianidæ. Its white mantle, delicately vermiculated with black, extends like a wedding veil over the head, back and tail, in striking contrast to the blue-black underparts, red cheek patches, and red legs.
This bird was formerly pictured in embroidery upon the heart and back badges of the official dresses of civil mandarins to denote the rank of the wearer, and is found only in southern and western China. It is by no means abundant in the parts of Yün-nan which we visited and, moreover, lives in such dense jungle that it is difficult to find. The natives sometimes snare the birds and offer them for sale alive.
We also saw monkeys at our camp on the Salween River, but were not successful in killing any. They were probably the Indian baboon (Macacus rhesus) and, for animals which had not been hunted, were most extraordinarily wild. They were in large herds and sometimes came down to the water to skip and dance along the sand and play among the rocks. The monkeys invariably appeared on the opposite side of the river from us and by the time we hunted up the boatmen and got the clumsy raft to the other shore the baboons had disappeared in the tall grass or were merrily running through the trees up the mountain-side.
The valley was too dry to be a very productive trapping ground for either small or large mammals, but the birds were interesting and we secured a good many species new to our collection. Jungle fowl were abundant and pigeons exceedingly so, but we saw no ducks along the river and only two cormorants.
Very few natives crossed at the ferry during our stay, for it is a long way from the main road and the climb out of the gorge is too formidable to be undertaken if the Salween can possibly be crossed higher up where the valley is wide and shallow. While we were camped at the river the heat was most uncomfortable during the middle of the day and was but little mitigated by the wind which blew continually. During mid-summer the valley at this point must be a veritable furnace and doubtless reeks with fever. We slept under nets at night and in the early evening, while we were watching for peacocks, the mosquitoes were very troublesome.
CHAPTER XXXIV
THE GIBBONS OF HO-MU-SHU
It is a long hard climb out of the Salween valley. We left on March 24 and all day crawled up the steep sides on a trail which doubled back and forth upon itself like an endless letter S. From our camp at night the river was just visible as a thin green line several thousand feet below, and for the first time in days, we needed a charcoal fire in our tents.
We were en route to Lung-ling, a town of considerable size, where there was a possibility that mail might be awaiting us in care of the mandarin. Although ordinarily a three days' journey, it was more than four days before we arrived, because I had a sharp attack of malaria shortly after leaving the Salween River and we had to travel half stages.