THE

Birds of Calcutta

BY

FRANK FINN

B.A., F.Z.S., M.B.0.U.

THACKER, SPINK & CO., CALCUTTA

CORNELL
LAB of ORNITHOLOGY |

|

LIBRARY
at Sapsucker Woods —

Illustration of Bank Swallow by Louis Agassiz Fuertes

JouNn P. Younc |

Cornell University Library
QL 691.14F51 1917

WOT
3 1924 022 516 292

orn

Cornell University

The original of this book is in
the Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions in
the United States on the use of the text.

http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022516292

THE

BIRDS OF CALCUTTA

THE

BIRDS OF CALCUTTA

BY

FRANK FINN, B.A. (OXON.), F.Z.S., M.B.O.U

AUTHOR OF “FANCY WATER-FOWL,” \
““yow TO KNOW THE INDIAN DUCKS,”
“HOW TO KNOW THE INDIAN WADERS,” ETC

THIRD EDITION

CALCUTTA: THACKER, SPINK & GO:

1917

eL eee eeares

PRINTED BY

THACKER, SPINK AND CO., CALCUTTA.

4

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

Tar kind reception accorded to the first
edition of the present little work has been
deemed a justification for its reproduction
in an improved form. A few necessary alter-
ations have been made to bring it up to date,
-. and the chapters have been re-arranged so
as to bring the birds dealt with into the same
order as that in which they occur in the
Fauna of British India, Bird volumes. The
scientific names used for Indian birds are
those of the above work, the few foreign
species mentioned bearing the name given
them in the British Museum Catalogue of
Birds.

The usefulness of the book will, it is hoped,
be enhanced by the illustrations, which have
been drawn by that well-known ornithological
artist, Mr. Herbert Goodchild, in most cases

vi PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

from living birds in the collection of the
London Zoological Society.

Lonpov, FRANK FINN.
January 1904.

CONTENTS.

THE CRow ..
THE MacPig

THE SEVEN SISTERS
THE BULBUL

Tue KIne-crow
THE TaILoR-BIRD
THE ORIOLE

THe Mynan

Tuer Daya

Tue SPARROW
Tue HoNEYSUCKER
THe WooDPECKER
Tuer CoPprpERSMITH
Tue BLUE-JAY
Tue KINGFISHER
Tue Swift ..
Tue Koger ..
Tuer PaRRoT

THe OWL

THE VULTURE
Tue Kite

Tue Dove ..
THE GULL

Tue Pappy-Birp.

Paces.

THE
BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

I.—THE CROW.
|
‘ Even the blackest of them all, the Crow. ’’—Longfellow.

Back though he is, the Crow may fairly head
the list for more reasons than one. His clan is
reckoned by most ornithologists as the most blue-
blooded among the birds, and comes first in the
order of precedence in the official list in the “ Fauna
of British India.” And he himself, full no doubt.
of consciousness of his egregious merits, has already
made his bow. to all my readers, even if they have
resided in India but for a day. Various people have
amused themselves at the expense of naturalists who
call him Corvus splendens, but it would be hard to:
find a better name. See him, as I first saw him, in
the London Zoo among a number of other species
of his kind, and you will at once pronounce him the
sleekest, glossiest, and best got-up fellow of the lot,
for most of his upper plumage has an exquisite satiny
gloss of purple and green, admirably set off by his
grey neck and coal-black mask and cap. In this,
F, BC 1

2 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

pattern of colour, as well as in size, he certainly very
much recalls the jackdaw (Corvus monedula) at home,
but he has a very much longer and heavier bill, and
dark instead of white eyes. The difference between
the two species may be at once noticed even in the
mounted specimens in a Museum, and is much more
conspicuous in the living birds, as specific distinctions
most commonly are.

There is nothing to choose in the matter of gloss
and richness of plumage between the male and female
Crows, but the former’s bigger head and bill will
distinguish him easily if both are seen together:
the difference in feature is hardly marked enough
to sex any Crow by itself. Young Crows when they
leave the nest have light blue eyes and pink mouths,
but they do not look innocent on that account—
rather, with their duller, shabbier plumage, more
blackguardly than their dark-eyed, black-mawed
parents ; the old Crow being, if anything, rather
blacker inside than out, as far as one can see when
he opens his mouth to caw.

The Crow, unlike the Ethiopian of ae can
change his skin, or rather his feathers, for pied, white
and dun-coloured specimens are not unknown ; one
of the last mentioned kind lived for more than a dozen
years in the Alipore Zoo. The white birds have
flesh-coloured legs and beaks, and in the duns the

THE CROW. 3

parts that should be grey in the normally-coloured
‘Crow are lighter than the rest. Such “ off-coloured ”
Crows are said to be tabooed by Crow society, but
this does not seem to be the case with birds suffering
from deformity or disease. I knew for years a Crow
residing in or near Sudder Street which suffered
from some unsightly and doubtless highly unpleasant
disease of the feet, which makes those members look
as if the bird had just been walking in thick mud ;
and evidently they were very tender, judging from
the gingerly way in which this sufferer walked. Yet
I cannot doubt from the many accounts I have
received of it that a damaged Crow is often worried
to death by its fellows, and I myself once saw one that
seemed to have been having a very bad time at their
hands, or what did duty as such. But, nevertheless,
the Crow is a bird of many social virtues ; he will
certainly rescue a friend in distress if he can, for his
evident and loudly expressed indignation when one
handles a dead or living comrade of his makes it plain
that a less powerful enemy than man would probably
be seriously attacked. Also he is a good husband,
feeding his wife assiduously, and lettmg her pull
their common booty away from him ; and a tender
parent, much attached to his abominable offspring,
in defence of which Crows will attack even a human
being at times. The Crow, however, while looking

4 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

leniently on head-tickling and such-like simple
connubial reciprocities, is very severe upon any
unfortunate couple of his kind who go too far in a
public display of affection, as I have witnessed on
more than one cccasion ; and as for the wing-drooping,
tail-cocking strut which the English rook indulges
in during the breeding season, any Calcutta Crow
who presumed to show off in such a way would most
likely be very soon taught that it was “no matter for
his swellings, nor his turkey-cocks.” This persistent
interference by Crows in each other’s domestic
affairs may be the reason why there seem to be so
few nests in proportion to the numbers of Crows one
sees. Although this Crow lives so much in the
company of man, it has not taken much to nesting in
buildings, usually preferring a tree; though here
and there pairs will attempt a nest on a house, and
Mr. B. Aitken, in Hume’s “ Nests and Eggs of Indian
Birds,” has given a long and amusing account of an
idiotic couple who wasted a whole breeding season in
trying to make nests in’ utterly impossible positions
in the verandah of the Madras Mail office ; other
eccentrics, wiser in their way, have built nests of
wire, and in one case even of gold and silver spectacle
frames. I have seen one bird which was vainly
trying with its mate to construct a nest in one of the
little round windows of the Economic and Art section

THE CROW. 5

of the Museum, soaking twigs in water, for what
reason I cannot divine, unless he thought they would
thereby become softer and stay in position, which
he was not at all successful in getting them to do.
The Crow evidently knows that water has a softening
effect, for I have seen a bird come down to a tank
with a piece of bread in his bill, put it into the water
to soak, while he had a drink and then fly off with it.
I have seen jackdaws also in the London Zoo do a
similar thing. It is indeed curious to speculate on
the extent of the Crow’s intelligence. Sometimes
when flying, you will see him transfer something
from his bill to his feet, and carry it thus a little way,
as if he were trying to learn the kite’s trick of using
bis feet for transport. Yet he never seems to learn
to pick things off water with his feet, though picking
objects up from that element at all is evidently an
acquired trick with him. I notice our Crows about
the Museum are very poor hands at picking things
off the tank, while the Hooghly Crows were quite
handy at water work. Similarly, the Grand Hotel
Crows are very good at catching flying, no doubt
owing to constant feeding by residents there. The
Crow’s intelligence is of course kept up toa high
level by the constant elimination of the young fools
by death or capture; the old bird knows well the
difference between a stick or umbrella and a gun.

6 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

I have almost touched one with an umbrella and
seen another suddenly recollect an appointment to a
distant part of Calcutta on catching sight of'a gun
in my verandah. That a Crow should know a gun
when he sees it, or that many birds should have a
working acquaintance with the range of that weapon,
is not so surprising a fact as might seem at first sight,
for we must remember that birds have to learn by
experience the appearance of their different natural
enemies and the distance at which the proximity of
each one becomes dangerous. Our Crow will pull
at a kite’s tail, or swoop on its back, out of pure
light-heartedness and mischief ; but he will not play
tricks of that kind with a falcon, though he makes no.
secret of his hatred of the nobler bird. Similarly,
I have seen Crows mobbing a tree-civet or toddy-cat,
but although they made a great deal of noise, they
took care to keep well out of reach ; while with a dog
they will go so far, I am told, as to tell off one of the
fraternity to pull bis tail when he is engaged with a
bone, so that when the aggrieved canine turns round
to snap, those in front can make off with his dinner.
And this I can readily believe, as I have seen exactly
the same trick played or attempted on a kite more
than once ; the Crows in the last cases I have observed
seemed undoubtedly to be pairs, which accounts for
their working together so well. No doubt the female

THE CROW. T

does the tail-pulling, while the male takes the post of
danger in front ; in one instance I made sure of this
from the forbearing behaviour of the Crow which had
snatched the bone of contention, which he was able
to do before any tail-pulling had taken place. I
have alluded to the Crows annoying kites by way
of recreation, and there is no doubt whatever that
this is the object, just’ as they seem to take pleasure
in letting a man come as near them as is consistent
with safety. But they seem also to have regular
games ; at any rate I cannot otherwise account for
the habit they have of assembling in the evening
and playing what looks very like “I’m the king of
the castle” on the Museum lightning-conductors,
for the spiky top of these rods is not a pleasant seat
for a Crow; and yet they are constantly trying to
sit on them at this time.

The Crow on the whole must have a very happy
life. He cannot want for food, for in addition to his
natural prey of carrion and insects, he can pick up or
steal all sorts of remnants of man’s food; which
makes it the more remarkable that his feeding habits
are at times so unspeakably nasty. His enemies,
outside man, who does not often get a chance at him,
are few ; and that the struggle for existence does not
press him very hard seems obvious from the fact
that he always has plenty of time to spare in annoying

|
‘

8 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

other creatures, from men to lizards. I have heard of
a Crow watching one of those reptiles laying and
eating up the eggs one by one! He is indeed a
terrible pest to anything that is weak and helpless,
though he often meets his match in a most unexpect-
ed way. Ihave seen him soundly beaten by the little
spotted dove—about the last adversary one would
expect him to fear—but a bad conscience no doubt
makes him a coward.

What are his relations to the Jungle-crow (Corvus
macrorhynchus) I do not know. Every now and
then one hears, even in Calcutta, the provincial
accents of this Mofussilite, and catches sight of him,
easily distinguishable from the urban bird by his
greater size and entirely black plumage. Is the
smaller bird the master—not an unknown case among
allied species—or is the size of the Jungle-crow a
disadvantage to him when flying amongst buildings ?
At any rate, one has to get some distance away from
Calcutta before one finds the big black Crow at al]
common. Yet he has a very wide range, from Gilgit
where he meets the true raven with which he is
sometimes confounded, to Siam and Singapore ; and
he is also the Crow of the Andamans, so that he must
possess considerable powers of adapting himself to
circumstances. But, from the fact that the Hima-
layan birds are the smallest and those from the

THE CROW. 9

Andamans and Burma the largest, we may infer that
he likes a hot stuffy climate better than a cool bracing
one. It is the other way with the true raven (Corvus
corax), which is easily distinguished by his greater
size and the beard of pointed hackles on his throat, for
this bird is largest and finest in the hills and dwindles
into a puny race when he lives in the plains ; but he
is always considerably bigger than the Jungle-crow.
Our familiar Calcutta friend is mostly confined to
India, and to low elevations there, and does not seem
to vary much in size, though in the drier parts his
neck gets nearly white, and in Ceylon so much darker
that it attracts the attention of any one who observes
him ; on the Burmese frontier he has a near relative
in the Burmese House-crow (Corvus insolens) which
is of the same size, but dark-necked and with a different
note, but similar in habits. Outside India he
has of late years been introduced as a scavenger
into Zanzibar, where I first made his acquaintance in
the wild state; but as a sanitary bird he is, in my
opinion, much inferior to his hated rival, the kite.
Moreover, there are, of course, Crows of other kinds
in Africa, as there are in all the large divisions of the
world except in South America, where the place of
these birds is taken by the carrion hawks, which
exhibit in their habits the combined rascality of Crow
and kite. One of this group can often be seen at

10 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Zoological Gardens in the person of the Caracara
hawk, a very handsome but cowardly and mischievous
bird. It will be interesting to see what will happen
when Crows at length gain a footing in South America,
for some one is sure to introduce them sooner or later
just as our own rook (Corvus frugilegus) at home
was lately his trial in South Africa. Of course indis-
criminate introduction like this is much to be
condemned from the point of view of the practical
man, though from that of the naturalist it is of
great interest, for future generations of observers
will find in it an experiment in evolution.

Crows are certain to have an important influence
on the fauna of a countzy, if only from their cunning
and their long life. Whether Hesiod, when he said
“Nine generations lives the croaking Crow,” was
strictly accurate is open to considerable doubt ; the
oldest Indian Crow I ever knew was at least fifteen
and looked as young as ever he could have done. He
was in the London Zoo, and I remember particularly
that one very hard winter, although in an out-of-
door aviary, he looked about the most cheerful bird
in the gardens ; so that if he haunts a warm climate
here it is not because he cannot stand a cold one.
There is no doubt that he feels the heat very badly,
but he probably finds that an easy livelihood has
compensating advantages.

THE CROW. Il

I fear, indeed, that things are made too easy for him,
for he is no doubt a deadly enemy to many smaller
and more attractive birds, besides being a great
nuisance to ourselves by his noise and pilfering, in
which latter pursuit he will become appallingly
impudent. When I used to encourage Crows, I
remember one coming into my room after chota-hazri,
taking a couple of mouthfuls out of the butter on
my plate, and staying to wipe his beak on a pamphlet
that lay handy before he sought the top of the jillmill!
When you give him an inch he will take an ell, and
my policy towards the Crows was one of war to the
knife, for I think one pair to a compound is a fair
working average. The Crows knew it, too, I think,
for I was not popular with them; but for all that
I would be the last to advocate the entire extermi-
nation of such a polished scoundrel as Corvus splendens.

Indian Magpie. *
Dendrocitta rufa.

Ji.—_THE MAGPIE.

“Proud and pert as is a Pie.”—Chaucer.

Tre common Indian Magpie (Dendrocitia rufa) is
certainly not the equal in pride and pertness of the
European bird which Chaucer knew. For one thing
it has less to be proud of, being soberly costumed in
cinnamon and silver-grey instead of snow-white and
glossy black like Pica rustica at home. Nor does
it come down on the ground and swagger about there ;

THE MAGPIE. 13

its legs are very short, and restrict its movements
to hopping on the very rare occasions when it does
descend from the trees. Usually it keeps aloft,
searching among the foliage for any small-game that
may present itself in the way of insects or young
birds ; and though conspicuous in its slow dipping
flight from tree to tree, it is perhaps more often heard
than seen. Its ordinary notes are certainly not
more melodious than those of the home Magpie, one
native name, “ Handi-chancha” well expressing
one of them; but it can produce some very pretty
metallic sounds if it likes. Whether it can learn to
talk I do not know; the natives, at all events, do not
seem to make a pet of it, although one may now
and then see the young birds on sale in the Bazaars..
They may be known at once by their resemblance
to their parents, though they are much lighter in
colour, being buff instead of cmnamon. Of the old
birds both sexes are alike, as is the rule among the crow
tribe. At first sight the long-tailed, short-winged,
and short-legged Indian Pie looks very different.
from the well-proportioned crow, none of whose
members are unduly developed ; but she has much
the same character of cautious audacity, and, although
not a “ galley-ranger ” like her black kindred, is very
accommodating in appetite. Jerdon relates a case
in which one used to daily visit a cage of small birds.

14 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

in a verandah, at first in order to eat the seed supplied
to them; soon, however, he passed from petty
larceny to murder, and was ultimately executed.
No doubt Pies, even more than crows, act as a
healthy check on the exuberant domesticity of Philip
Sparrow, which would otherwise overflow in those
arboreal colonies in which his soul delights in safer
localities than Calcutta. But Mag cannot be a very’
dangerous neighbour to most small birds, seeing
that they flourish so well in our midst in spite of her
presence and presumably not altogether disinterested
enquiries into the progress of their home and family
arrangements. She has no particular ill-wishers
herself, for birds of the crow kind are seldom attacked
by others, unless it be by the larger owls who steal
upon them under cover of darkness ; but the king-
crow, in exercise of his office of supervisor of all
doubtful characters in the feathered world, has been
seen to harry her, clinging to her tail and being thus
towed along for some distance. Whatever be the
cause, although our Indian Magpie favours thorny
twigs for building with, she does not, like the Euro-
pean bird, construct a dome with them over her
nest, but sticks to the usual corvine pattern of an .
open cup. In the matter of eggs, however, she
boldly defies convention, for she will have them
with the pale ground colour tinted either pink or green,

THE MAGPIE. 15

and enriched with spots varying in hue from bright
red to dull brown. In respect to refreshments, on
the other hand, besides exhibiting the family readiness
to take whatever comes to hand, she is a true crow
in having as frugal a mind as John Gilpin’s wife,
and in time of plenty will lay up stores fora rainy day.
This I found out from the only specimen of
the bird I ever kept, discovering that it had laid up
bits of meat in various parts of its large cage soon
after receiving the ration.

To whatever cause we may ascribe the result, the
common Indian Pie is a very successful bird, and
extends its range nearly all over the Empire from
Cashmere to Tenasserim; and, although quite at
home in the sweltering atmosphere of the plains
ascends the Himalayas up to 7,000 feet, and thrives
particularly well there, hill specimens being of larger
growth than those bred lower down. This is curious,
for our cinnamon friend has a relative which is a
thorough mountaineer, never living in the plains,
though I have seen it as low down as Rajpore in the
Doon. And this bird is smaller than the common
one, although living under the same conditions in
which its rival so adds to its stature. This hill
Tree-pie (Dendrocitta himalayensis) is not so
handsome a bird as its more widely distributed
relative, its prevailing hue being a dark iron-grey.

16 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Wherever our “ wandering Pie ”’—as it is called in
some books—goes in India, it will find poor relatives,
much resembling itself in all but colour, which,
for some reason or other, have failed to spread as
Dendrocitta rufa has done. At present the problem
defies solution; but as the distribution of birds
generally has been pretty well mapped out by this
time, I hope the day is not far distant when ornitho-
logists will begin to try and find out the reasons for
it—why, for instance, one species of a genus should
be able to live almost anywhere, as in the present
case, while the others have bounds set to their
wanderings.

The European Magpie, sometimes seen as a pet.
in Calcutta, where it has been imported from China,
is another good case of a successful bird, for it is
found all round the Northern Hemisphere, and is.
still extending its range, having invaded Ireland and.
become very common there even in human knowledge,
though not by any means recently. Even in our
Indian Empire it appearsin Cashmere and Upper
Burma, and the clan of Tree-pies may yet find in it
a dangerous competitor, for a bird that is active
both below and aloft has advantages which few
possess.

A word seems needed for other exotic Magpies often
seen in Calcutta as pets. These are the white-backed.

THE MAGPIE. 17

and black-backed Australian Magpies, better known
in books as Piping Crows (Gymnorhina leuconota and
G. tibicen). These are short-tailed pied birds, about
the size of the common house-crow, and are quite as
much allied to the shrikes as to the true crows,
though they more closely resemble the latter in form
and habits. They have and deserve a high reputa-
tion, -for they are good and very free talkers, and
their own natural note is a beautiful whistle, very
different from the varied cacophony of the genuine
Magpie and crow. It is not surprising, therefore,
that they readily learn to whistle tunes, though in
their case, as in our own, “a little knowledge” is
objectionable. The London Zoo had one once which
persistently whistled a lme and a half of a song.
With this, as the late Mr. A. Bartlett told me, he
habitually saluted the morn, and got so annoying
» that he had to be banished from the precincts of
the Superintendent’s dwelling to the Western Aviary.
For, as the narrator of the episode said, he “ used
to lie in bed and sweat, waiting for him to begin !”

Babbler.
i Crateropus canorus.

TIl.—-THE SEVEN SISTERS.

“ We are seven.” —Wordsworth.

Some years back, a new Viceroy was being shown
the wonders of his temporary kingdom, and among
these the Taj at Agra held, of course, an important
place. Arrived before the glorious monument of
Eastern love and pride, “the artless Aide-de-Camp
was mute; the gilded staff were still’? as Kipling
says, in anxious expectation of the comment of His
Excellency. But this, alas ! when it came, was merely
the remark : “ What are those funny little birds ?”
The shock must have been the greater for the fact

THE SEVEN SISTERS. 19

that the mean fowls thus honoured were, it seems,
of that singularly disreputable species which is
commonly known in India as the ‘ Seven Sisters ”’
or “ Seven Brothers,” or by the Hindustani equivalent
of sat-bhat. In books it gets called the Jungle
Babbler, the first part of the name being inappro-
priate. for it is found everywhere, and the last
singularly happy, for it does babble with a vengeance.
As may be inferred from their popular names, these
birds go about in small packs of about half-a-dozen—
there are not invariably seven, nor can these be a
family party, smce only three or four eggs are laid.
They hop about searching for food on the ground
or branches, murmuring squeakily to themselves
meanwhile, and ever and anon burst out into a
startling volley of wheezy hysterical chatter, which
gets terribly upon one’s nerves in time in a place
where they are common. Linneus, when he called
the bird Turdus canorus, the tuneful thrush, must
have been wildly ignorant of it, or have hopelessly
mixed it up with an ally anda real songster, the
huamei of China (Tvochalopterum canorum), which
he included under the same name. Modern orni-
thologists callour babbling brotherhood Crateropus
canorus, placing them ina different family from the
true thrushes, to which they nevertheless bear a
strong general resemblance in form and size. But

20 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

the differences are very soon perceptible if one studies.
the living birds. Your thrush is sleek, stiff, and
starch ; he is a musical artist, but allows himself no
artistic license in his dress which is neat to primness.
The Babblers, on the contrary, have a fluffy, frowsy
appearance ; their tails hang loosely, and their wings,
which are short, are not neatly tucked up as they
should be, but lie anyhow. Nor have they the
excuse of pleasing colour, such as many clumsy birds.
can boast of ; a brownish grey, of “ unparalleled
dignitude ” as Baboo Jabberjee would say, is almost.
the only hue visible in their attire, and is not parti-
cularly well set off by a white eye like a jackdaw’s.
and whitish legs and bill of an unpleasantly anemic
appearance. There is, however, a real interest
attaching to these disreputable-looking birds. We
are all familiar with Lamb’s appallingly ugly lady
whose facial turpitude was supposed to be atoned
for by the possession of superlative moral excellence ;
and unquestionably fraternal affection is the strong
point of the babbling brotherhood. In the grave
pages of the Asiatic Society’s Journal a friend of
mine has recorded his frequent experience of the
devoted courage with which these feeble-winged
creatures will rush to the defence of a comrade held
in the grip of a trained hawk ; on one occasion the
victim was actually rescued by its comrades before

THE SEVEN SISTERS. 21

the hawk could receive its master’s assistance, and
-on another, one of the Babblers was caught by hand
as it clung to the back of its relative’s murderer.
No one, so far as I am aware, has recorded behaviour
anything like this on the part of our song-thrush
(Turdus musicus), who appears to be rather a coward,
although his near relative the missel-thrush (Turdus
viscivorus) will show fight boldly in defence of his
home and mate. And with regard to these Babblers
courage appears to be a variable quality even in this
particular species; for Dr. Jerdon expressly states
that the Jungle Babbler will not attack a trained hawk
flown at the flock as the bolder Mahratta Babbler
(Argya maleolmt) will. Dehra Dun, therefore, where
‘the above incident occurred, must be inhabited by
a peculiarly warlike clan of Crateropus canorus, and
certainly they are very numerous there and obtru-
sively noisy. That sociability is a passion with the
species no one who has studied it can doubt ; I have
kept several, and have found that they almost
invariably exhibited the spirit of the poet’s goldfinch,
who
“ 4 prison with a friend preferred
To liberty without.”

If one found himself outside the cage which
contained the happy family, he “ did his possible ” to
get in again without any thought of escape. It may

22 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

be ungenerously suggested that such birds are afraid.
to go about alone, lest their ribald remarks, made
in the security of numbers, meet with a just retalia-
tion at the beaks and claws of outraged bird society ;
and so it may be, but nevertheless there is a well-
spring of sincere sociability under the Babbler’s.
frowsy feathermg. On the comparatively rare occa-
sions when my captives were still, they employed.
themselves in affectionately tickling each other’s.
heads as they cuddled together, and I have even seen.
one diligently employed in endeavouring to clean.
the wing of a friend, soiled by the bird lime with.
which its capture had been effected. At the same
time it must be admitted that the addition to their
ordinary diet of table scraps of such a delicacy as a
cockroach was apt to produce a sad disruption of
fraternal harmony. On such occasions one might
see one brother prone in the sand, while another,
holding his head ‘in chancery” with one foot,
was punching the same with his beak in a
manner calculated to awake graye fears for the
integrity of the sufferer’s skull when the punishment.
should be over ; and once I saw two birds adherent
with bill and claw to one and the same cockroach,
which a third was devouring, as neither of the joint
owners dared to let go his hold! These traits of
character would seem to show that Crateropus:

~

THE SEVEN SISTERS. 23

canorus is in about the same stage of moral evolution
as that represented by the public school boy, a gallant
defender of his kind against the assaults of “ cads,”
‘“‘nippers,” and ‘‘ vulgar plebs” generally, but
inclined also to be severe on them in individual
disputes.

The reason for the development of such clannish-
ness is obvious when the very weak flight of this .
bird is noticed ; the short wings are beaten quickly
for a short distance, and the labour is economised
by a gliding skim till a fresh effort is required ; and
with such a method of flight escape by aerial evolu-
tions is very much at a discount. On his feet the
Babbler is much more at home, and hops along with
considerable speed, never running smoothly as the
true thrushes often do. He differs from these birds
also in another noticeable poimt in the use of the
feet, having the crow-like habit of using them to
hold anything large he is eating—a thing no thrush
would stoop to do—or think of doing, more likely.
Babblers also resemble crows and differ from most
thrushes in the young birds being like their parents ;
young thrushes being, as everyone knows, much more
spotted than old ones. Whether the Babblers go
through any elaborate courtship ceremony I cannot
say; male and female are equally ugly, but this
does not prevent some birds from making themselves

24 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

ridiculous before the object of their affections, and
possibly these are among the number—a Babbler
could not be dignified if he tried. Their nest is just
about the sort of abode one would expect them to
build, a simple cup, more or less loose and untidy,
placed almost anywhere in shrubs or trees. But
the eggs are the one beautiful thing about the bird,
being of that lovely blue so noticeable in the hedge-
sparrow’s at home, and very glossy in addition. As
above implied the young ones fledge off very like
the old, but they have dark brown instead of white
eyes. A very plump one I experimentally ate tasted
much like a quail, and herein perhaps lies an
economic possibility for the “Seven Sisters’; the
clan would just about fill a pie. The French in
Algeria regard the local Babbler there (Argya fulva)
as gibier, but their notions in that matter are known
to be liberal ; witness the colonists in New Caledonia
who used to eat the local crow, until one day a native
. asked one of these sportsmen why the white men
ate what they religiously avoided, giving as a reason,
when questioned, that the said crows ate them when
exposed dead on platforms in the forest according
to custom. After this crow ceased to figure in the
Colonial menu.

The said Algerian Babbler is the nearest of the
family to Europe, and generally speaking, Babblers

THE SEVEN SISTERS. 25 |

inhabit Africa and the Oriental region only. Our
familiar suburban friend, which is found all over
India, is the only one about here in a wild state
though several of his more or less close relatives may
be met with at bird-dealer’s places, including the
abovementioned huanmei of China, recognizable by
its russet plumage and white eyebrows, and another
species common to that country and Further India,
the slate-coloured, white-cheeked Chinese mocking-
bird or peko (Dryonastes chinensis), which, though
obviously of the vulgar Babbler family, is a finer
songster than almost any bird I have heard, and a
mocker to boot. Some day, possibly, when people
begin to realize that desirable birds can be cultivated
in gardens as well as desirable plants (the efforts of
humanity in the former direction hitherto having
been largely expended in the acclimatization of
nuisances) we may have the peko making our gardens
melodious and supplanting the “ shrieking sisterhood ”
altogether—a consummation devoutly to be wished,
although, till some such better bird takes their place,

\. their industriously insectivorous habits may give

them a raison Wétre.

Common Bengal Bulbul.
Molpastes bengalensis.

IV.—THE BULBUL.

“ The Bulbul, which did chase the jewelled butterflies.” —
Arnold.

CoNsIDERING what a charming and characteristic
feature butterflies form in the tropical landscape,
it would not be much to the Bulbul’s credit if
chasing them were his most noteworthy occupation.
Undoubtedly he does catch butterflies sometimes, for
I once saw a wild Bulbul with one in his bill—not.
vs jewelled,” but plain white—and he will eat them.

THE BULBUL. 27

readily enough in confinement. But, on the other
hand, fruit is undoubtedly his more ordinary food ;.
a certain Lantana bush I wot of is much resorted to.
by both Bulbuls and butterflies, and the berries
seem to be the birds’ only object in visiting it. And
captive Bulbuls display an indiscriminateness in.
taste as regards the species of butterflies they devour
that would shock many of the exponents of “ warning
colouration in insects ”; eating, without the stimulus
of hunger, species which other birds will avoid unless.
they have no choice allowed. This may be inter-
preted in two ways. Hither the Bulbul is such a
common bird because he doesn’t care what he eats;
or he is a mere amateur in butterfly-eating, and
doesn’t know what’s good, like a young bird
who has his experience to gain. Certainly his insect--
catching when at liberty is mostly concerned with
smaller game, for it is not always easy to see what
he takes when he rises in the air a short distance and.
then drops back to his perch. For he is a bird of
varied abilities ; he can skip about gracefully among
the branches of a shrub, though he is more given
to sitting on the top ; and on the wing his movements-
though not particularly powerful or swift, are easy
and graceful to a degree. Only on the ground is he
awkward, for his legs are too short for him to hop.
with much agility or keep his tail clear ; but he does.

28 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

not often descend to earth, and wisely. No small
bird looks well on the ground unless he can run, like
the wagtail, and even then he is rather insignificant.
But place the Bulbul as one generally sees him,
on a lofty spray, his jetty crest erect, and his tail
drooping in a négligé manner all his own, and it is
difficult to find a small bird so picturesque. True, his
black fore-quarters fade off to dusty brown on the
wings and iron-grey on the breast, and the only
bright colour he boasts is the silky crimson patch
modestly concealed under the root of his tail; but
even so he is more strikingly attired than most
European birds. Both cock and hen are also equally
well dressed ; but the young are duller and look
‘rather shabby, especially as they have to wear a
rusty-buff escutcheon instead of a blood-red one.
This curiously-placed bit of colour seems a family
feature with Bulbuls; it is always either red or
yellow, however, when it occurs at all, other tints
being strictly barred. The only Bulbul which occurs
in Europe—in the Cyclades—bears a yellow patch,
being otherwise of a snuffy brown; and this is
possibly the bird which has got mixed up with the
nightingale in Eastern poetry, as it occurs in Pales-
‘tine, and is there called Bulbul by the Arabs. Bulbul
in Persian is always supposed to mean the true
nightingale, the lover of the rose, and there seems

THE BULBUL. 29

to be no reason to doubt the correctness of the
identification—though it may be mentioned that the
Persian nightingale (Daulias golzii) is not absolutely
dentical with the European bird. More to the point.
are the facts that the Yarkandis call the barred
warbler (Sylvia nisoria) the Bulbul, and that the
Palestine Bulbul (Pycnonotus xanthopygus) above
alluded to is a really fine singer. So that whatever
bird was called by the name to start with, it seems
to be about as indefinite among Orientals as.
“ Mocking-bird ” and “Sparrow” are in our own
language. However, in India “Bulbul” is taken.
by both natives and Europeans in a very definite
signification for a large group of pretty birds, of
which our dark Bengal species (Molpastes bengalensis).
may very fairly claim to be the type. He certainly
is not much of a songster, but his notes are never
harsh and always singularly cheerful and liquid,
conveying an unequivocal sense of happiness and
well-being ; and he is a thoroughly nice bird. He
is not obtrusively sociable nor peevishly solitary
and quarrelsome ; when the natives make him fight,
it is by showing two hungry birds a morsel of food,
over which of course there is a conflict. It is for
this purpose that he is so often kept tame, tied to.
a cloth-padded, T-shaped iron perch by a long string
connected with a soft thread round his body..

30 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Fortunately, he does not seem to get much damaged in
‘these fights, and at the end of the winter, the bulbul-
fighting season, he is released, unless he has proved
‘himself an exceptional champion and worth reserving
for future triumphs. It is ashame to make use o
his courage in this way, for he is really a plucky
bird, and will even beat off a crow from his nest
although not more than half as large again as a
‘sparrow himself. The said nest is an open one placed
an a bush, and has nothing particularly remarkable
about it. The eggs, however, are very pretty, being
pinky-white with red spots, a common colour in the
family. Young Bulbuls taken just as their tails
begin to grow are easily reared and become very
¢ame, making most charming pets ; I had one which
was allowed full liberty, and was at times quite a
nuisance by its determination to follow me about.
The Bulbul, indeed, seems to have a warm heart,
although as above noted not fussily affectionate with
its kind ; a well-known English authority on cage
birds has recorded that a male Bulbul in his
possession had his paternal instincts so quickened by
witnessing the rearing of a brood of American blue
robins (Sialia sialis) in the same aviary that he
insisted on taking a helping hand, and even murder-
ously ‘attacked the real father for not altogether
resigning in his favour. This, indeed, might be

THE BULBUL. 31

wonsidered as carrying matters rather too far, but
after all the poor bird was no worse than any other
“well meaning person.”

Red-whiskered Bulbul.

Otocompsa emeria.

I have never noticed what are the exact relations
friendly or otherwise, between the black Bulbul and
his smaller. relative the Red-whiskered (Otocompsa
emeria) which is also not uncommon here. The
Red-whiskered Bulbul is not nearly so numerous,
and is easily distinguished by his white breast and
throat, and by having his red under-tail-patch
reproduced on his cheeks in two small scarlet tufts.
Besides he is considerably smaller, and has a much

32 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

longer crest, elegantly tapered to a point. Alto-
gether he is a~very pretty little bird, and one which
would attract attention anywhere. He has a much
wider range than the larger Bulbul, extending from
India to Siam and China, while the other species is
not found outside this country, and is confined here
to the north-east, being replaced elsewhere by other
species very much resembling it, but not so. big or
so black. In Western and Southern India the Red-
whiskered Bulbul also gives place to another species,
which is, however, very like it, chiefly differing in
having no white tip tothe tail. Both of our Bulbuls.
must be fairly hardy birds, for they range up the
Himalayas to quite a temperate climate ; however,
they no doubt come down in the winter just like
human visitants to the hills—which is where a hill-
bird has such an advantage over one that has to
make a long migration on the level.

I have seen variations of both our species of
Bulbuls ; in the case of the larger one the “ freak”
was ash-grey and in the smaller, white, the red.
markings persisting in each case, as indeed red colour
usually does in albino varieties. Both “sports”
were very pretty, and as Bulbuls will breed in con-
finement, they would be well worth taking some
trouble to perpetuate. But no one is likely to take
that trouble in India, and Bulbuls are not very

THE BULBUL. 33

commonly kept at home, although both of our species
can be obtained there at more or less moderate prices.
The Bulbul, unfortunately for its reputation for a
cage-bird, has only beauty of form to recommend it,
and the home fancier demands a song or gaudy
colour if he is to honour a non-seed-eating bird
with a place in his aviaries, with the occasional
variation of “ starring it” on the show bench.

F, BC 3

V.—THE KING-CROW.

“ I am the monarch of all I survey.”—Cowper.

Tue King-Crow, or Drongo as he is called in books,
has a wide enough kingdom to rule over, extending
from West Africa to China, and here in India he may
claim to be one of our most characteristic birds, for
it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that there
is one of these jet-black, fork-tailed birds between
every two telegraph posts for many miles of country.
Where there are no’ telegraph-wires the King -Crow

THE KING-CROW. 35

will put up with a dead branch or a cow’s back;
he wants some perch that will afford a clear outlook
and plenty of room for evolutions around it, and
though sometimes, as on the matdan, he will sit
about on the ground, he is grievously falling from
the traditions of his family in so doing, for the
Drongos generally are as much given to pride of place
as the green pigeon, concerning which native
traditions avers that when it comes down to drink it
carries a twig in its feet, lest its enemies should say
that it had ever deigned to leave a perch. Perhaps our
common Drongo (Dicrurus ater) owes his prosperity
to waiving his family pride, since even settling to
catch prey is contrary to strict Drongo etiquette,
and he is constantly doing this, though he is active
enough at taking insects on the wing. But he is
by way of being a very versatile bird, and though he
appears never to touch vegetable food, he has been
known to take small birds as well as insects, and
even to capture small fish ; a feat of which no one
will deem him incapable who has seen him taking
his bath by plunges like a swallow, a method of
performing ablutions much favoured by birds which
are ready of wing. And the King-Crow is remark-
ably good at aerial evolutions, whence he is enabled
to maintain that authority over birds great and small
which the Deccanis have neatly expressed by calling

.

\

36 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

him kotwal, superintendent, of police. Armed with
very punishing beak and claws, he is a terror to evil-
doers like the kite and crow, who cannot catch him,
much as they would like to—I have seen a sickly
King-Crow fall a prey to a kite—but also, it is to be
regretted, at times a nuisance to the more peaceful
portion of the bird community, robbing them when
he can of their insect prey; although perhaps he
feels that this is merely an exaction of a tribute due
to his energetic exertions against the criminal classes,
which the public would churlishly withhold.

It must be admitted that he is sometimes very
unscrupulous ; a King-Crow has been known to give
the alarm of a hawk in order to frighten off a bird
which was capturing an insect which he wanted
himself, though such an action shows intelligence
of no mean order; and also exemplifies the vocal
powers of the King-Crow, which, like many other
birds possessed of a powerful and flexible voice, has
considerable aptitude for variations. His notes are
very pleasant, and he is almost the earliest bird to
tune up inthe morning. The male sand female King-
Crows are quite alike, and even the: young are fledged.
black at first, though afterwards they. become mottled
with white below, and it is years before this marking
disappears altogether. The eggs that give them
birth are very pretty, bemg salmon-coloured spotted

THE KING-CROW. 37

with red, though pure white ones are not uncommon.
They are deposited in an open nest in a tree, which
the parents vigorously defend ; but these, with all
their care, are liable to be imposed upon by a remark-
able cuckoo (Surniculus lugubris), which is one of
the very best instances of mimicry in nature, since it
resembles the Drongo, not only in size, but in
colour and form, having a. forked tail, an altogether
exceptional feature in the cuckoo family. No doubt
the impostor benefits in a general way by resembling
a bird which is given to making itself respected by
others, but the special advantage secured is probably
greater security in foisting its unwelcome offspring
on the Drongos ; this, however, it does not always
accomplish successfully, for an instance bas been
recorded in which the unfortunate cuckoo was
actually seen to be pecked to death by them.

I am not aware that this Drongo-cuckoo is found
about Calcutta, but this may possibly be the case,
as it is no doubt often passed over as a King-Crow ;
but anyone who notices one of these which looks
a little different from the rest, and on watching it
finds that it has the toes in pairs after cuckoo fasbion,
will know that he has seen a specimen of the mimic.

There is one thing about the King-Crow that
puzzles me considerably. Very often I have noticed
that one of the forks of the tail is much worn away ;

38 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

whether the right or the left I have not observed,
nor can I suggest an explanation—aunless it is that
the bird when sitting on a bough or wire and turning
round always does so on the same side, so as to bring
all the consequent friction on one-half of the tail.
The King-Crow’s tail, indeed, seems rather an
unwieldy member, for he does not lift it up in the air
when on the ground, where it must be rather in his
way, and although a forked tail is undoubtedly meant
as an aid to evolution in flight, in our present subject.
it seems unnecessarily long, and from its turned-up.
edges looks as if it were quite as much for ornament.
as for use.

The whole family of Drongos have more or less
forked tails; this and their almost invariably black
plumage easily distinguishing them from their near
relatives, the shrikes, of which a typical represent-
ative may be seen in Calcutta gardens in the person
of the brown shrike (Lanius cristatus) a bull-headed,
black-eyebrowed bird rather larger than a sparrow,
given to making highly unpleasant noises and very
appreciative of cockroaches thrown out for him.
Both shrikes and Drongos have the habit of holding
their food in one foot like a parrot, but the latter
are not known to impale their prey like the former.
No Drongos are found outside the Old World, but
in general domineering their place is ably filled in

THE KING-CROW. 39

America by the king-bird and other members of the
American family of tyrant-fiycatchers. In Europe
no bird seems to have taken up this position, though
the missel-thrush attempts it a little. Perhaps the
European birds are too free and independent to be
thus lorded over, or possibly the supply of insects is
not suitable for the support of birds which, although
as big as thrushes, do not hunt for their prey, but,
like Mr. Micawber, wait for something to turn up
and then come down on it, as is the custom of these
Oriental and American oligarchs in feathers. The
true shrikes, one would think, might fill such a place,
but they prefer devouring their smaller relatives to
waging war on birds of prey, though they hate them
well enough. I have only noticed one near relative
of the King-Crow about Calcutta, and that in the
Botanical Gardens, in the person of the Kesraj or
Hair-crested Drongo (Chibia hottentotta), a larger
species than the King-Crow, with a shorter tail and
longer bill, and exquisitely glossy plumage, deriving
its English name from the curious ornament of a few
long hairs springing from theforehead. This bird is
sociable, unlike the common Drongo, and does not
go in much for fly-catching, preferring to rummage
in flowers for honey and insects, for which purpose
its long, curved, fine-pointed bill is well adapted—
it is, in fact, a Drongo trying to turn honeysucker.

40 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Another cousin of the King-Crow’s, however, although
only known here as a captive, cannot be passed
over. This is the Bhimraj, or Racket-tailed Drongo
(Dissemurus paradiseus), a bird nearly as big as a
magpie, with the outer tail-feathers prolonged for
about a foot into long bare shafts, with a bit of
. feathering at the tip—an ornament which does not
usually stand much chance of maintaining its
perfection in the miserably small cages in which the
poor birds are usually confined. No wonder they do
not live long; very few, J am told, survive a year.
But given a big cage, say three or four feet square, the
Bhimraj is not difficult to keep; he will eat almost
anything, like one of the crow tribe, though the
more live insects he gets the better; and a lizard
he will tear to pieces with a positively fiendish joy:
He is, however, a very sociable bird, extremely fond
of being noticed and petted, and is the most
accomplished mimic in existence. The neigh of a
horse, the mew of a cat, and the song of a canary, he
will render in perfection, and has even been known to
talk—an accomplishment not recorded, so far as
I am aware, of the famous American mocking-bird.
To any one who wants a really good pet bird, I can
cordially recommend the Bhimraj.

VI.—_THE TAILOR-BIRD.

“ Singer and Tailor am I.”—Kipling.

HEREIN, and in the pretty stanza that follows, our
poet sadly flatters the Tailor-bird, for any one who
waits to hear “ Durzee ” sing will have much the
same experience as Mark Twain’s young pilgrim in
Palestine, who was discovered waiting patiently for
a vocal effort on the part of a mud-turtle, on the
strength of the text “the voice of the turtle is heard
in the land.” Singer our small cock-tailed friend is
not, though his note is something astonishing for
loudness, and gives reason, as has been justly
remarked, for thankfulness that the elephant does not
possess a voice in like proportion. Orthotomus sutorius,

42 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

however, doubtless feels that as the only member of
the melodious family of warblers commonly seen about:
here, it is due to his position to make his presence felt.
So, when the spirit moves him, he shouts “ to-whee,
to-whee, to-whee,” with such vigour that he gets
black on the side of the neck, having a cunningly
concealed patch of that colour there which only shows
when he is calling. Mrs. Durzee, no doubt, admires
both hue and cry, for, unlike most of our warblers at
home, Durzee goes in for conspicuous superiority to
his mate, at any rate in the breeding season, for then
he alone sports a tail about twice the usual length, and
elegantly tapered off. Except for this, the Tailor-bird
is in build very like our English wren, and were it.
brown, instead of green above and white below, might.
pass for one with a hasty observer, especially as its.
habits are very similar; it is generally solitary, and
equally lively on its legs when hopping on bush or
lawn, and weak on the wing when it trusts itself to
flight. Like ‘“‘ Jenny,” too, our sartorial artist is’
insectivorous, and will tackle insects of good size,
though he relies on his bill alone to manipulate them.
This makes it the more remarkable that he is able to
build the wonderful nest which gives him his name and
his reputation. A bird which puts its foot to a thing,
as the even more clever weaver-bird does, has a great
advantage over one which has but one instrument to

THE TAILOR-BIRD. 48

work with. But probably both of the tailors work at.
their wonderful structure, which is simply a big living,
leaf, or several, actually sewn into a rough bag for the
reception of the inner nest, with silk or fibre somehow
procured by' the bird, passed through holes bored in.
the leaves by its slender bill, and finished off at the end.
with what is said to bea knot. The nests vary very
much in construction as far as the details of tailoring
are concerned ; there may be, as above implied, one
leaf or many pressed into the service, and the thread.
may be of cobweb, cocoon-silk, vegetable fibre, or
real sewing-thread pilfered from a verandah ; for
the Tailor-bird is one of the most familiar of our
birds, and is to be seen even in town, tamely hopping
about pot-plants a few feet from a room.
Nevertheless, though broods have been often
brought off in the Museum compound, I have never
seen the nest am situ, and it is naturally not easy to
find. There is a good specimen of a single-leaf nest
in the Museum for any one to see who has not met
with an actual specimen; but the Tailor-bird’s
reputation is a century old in Europe, and many
people must have seen pictures giving more or less.
of an idea of it and its abode. The young birds are
cradled for the most patt in cotton-wool, of which
the inner nest is composed, and when they come out.
in the world are charmingly tame little things, with

44 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

a very strong likeness to their parents, except that
the chestnut cap which marks the old birds is not so
bright in the young; although in many warblers
the young birds are actually brighter than their
parents while keeping the same pattern.

The eggs are, according to Mr. Hume, from whom
I take my details about the nests, most remarkably
variable, for although always spotted with reddish
brown, they may have either a white or a bluish-
green ground colour. But as these two types do not
occur in the same nest, it is very probable that the
disposition to produce eggs of one or other colour “runs
in the family ” in certain strains of Tailor-birds, just
as a common duck has been known to secure her
‘destruction and that of her descendants (who took
after her) by laying eggs which always had yolks of the
‘very unappetising appearance of melted glue! There
-are only three or four in the clutch, so that Durzee
has not to work so hard for the family as Jenny Wren,
who is wont to resemble the traditional old lady who
lived in a shoe in the exuberance of her family.
Presumably the reason for the difference in two so
similar birds is that the hanging cradle won’t accom-
modate safely more than a very limited number of
infants, while the wren’s nest in a hedge can be packed ~
with impunity. Besides, the bitter struggle for
existence in a cold climate requires a considerable

THE TAILOR-BIRD. 45:

prolificacy to keep a small weak species going against
many risks. Now, though Durzee has doubtless a
great many ill-wishers, his food-supply is never likely
to fail, noris it ever cold enough in his home to nip
the smallest bird, seeing that he only inhabits warm,
climates, not ascending our hills more than 4,000 feet,.
and only ranging, outside India, into Burma, Siam,

and South China. Needless to say, he is not a migra-
tory bird, and any day at all seasons bis tiny form
may .be noticed in our gardens even in the middle
of thetown. Here, then, isan opportunity for any of
our amateur naturalists. It is doubtful if every detail
of the building of Durzee’s nest has ever been watched,.
as it has in the case of our other wonderful architect,.
the weaver; and any one who can locate a pair of
Tailor-birds in his or her compound, and, penetrating
into their secrets, tell us exactly how the thing is
done, they will be doing a service to ornithology ;
so much is there to study even im our commonest.
birds here, for India is the home of wonderful nest-
builders. There are other warblers in the tailoring
trade besides Orthotomus, and curiously enough these
also are non-migratory birds of insignificant vocal.
attamments ; the migratory warblers, who do most
of the warbling, like our blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla)
at home, being nothing out of the way as architects.
Darwin has observed that beauty and the power of

46 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

song seem to a great extent to replace each other ;
the songlessness of beautiful birds is almost
proverbial. And similarly songsters do not seem to
run to architecture, and vice versd ; the tailor and
weaver are more remarkable for noise than melody,
and the nightingale, with twenty centuries of
“reputation for music, is but a poor nest-constructor
compared with many humbler birds. Another curious
fact is that clever birds of any sort display the
infirmities of genius in a most marked way by having
nasty tempers; song birds are generally solitary,
and a weaver colony admirably exemplifies the
definition of a sociable animal as one which always
sits within quarrelling distance of another. I fear
that Durzee, although belonging to a profession
usually credited with peaceful proclivities, comes
under this indictment. He is certainly only about
the ninth part of a bird, but one never sees two
Tailor-birds together, unless they are husband and
wife or members of a family ; and oftener the little
artist is alone. Herein probably is the reason why
with habits so well calculated to preserve his species,
he is not more common ; two of a trade never agree,
and Durzee, like cock robin, has doubtless long ago
learnt that a private pitch is the first necessity of
life, and that after a time even the little apprentices
must be compelled to move into the next street.

VIT—THE ORIOLE.

“ There's a golden bird.”-—Hood.

GoLDEN indeed is the rich plumage of our Black-
headed Oriole (Oriolus melanocephalus), and the
prevailing hue is admirably set off by the black hood,
wings and. tail; while the pink bill and grey feet add
prettily contrasting details to the whole. This
fulness of beauty is most characteristic of the old
cock ; for young birds at first have the yellow body
much paler and streaked with black, and the black-
head, to equalize matters, duller and streaked with
yellow. The bill is also black, and altogether,
although as birds go rather showy, they are not to be

e

48 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

compared to their father. Their mother may be
like them, if she is still a young thing, but only then.
For among the happy birds good looks do not
deteriorate with age, and in some cases the gentler sex
become much more beautiful with advancing years.
And this is one of them ; for the hen Orioles become
in course of time almost as brilliant as their mates,
merely showing a tinge of green at times in the yellow
—but the change in their case does not take place
so early in life. It is curious to see how Nature is
continually striving to bring the hen bird up to her
mate’s level of beauty ; for the progressive increase
of beauty in the hen occurs in several groups, notably
in the hawks. This is quite a different thing from
the assumption of male plumage by hen birds which
by age or accident have become barren, such as often’
occurs among hen pheasants; and can only be
ascribed to a natural tendency on the part of the
species to progress in a given direction, the male
leading the way.

This is well seen in our domestic birds. If we
ornament an unoffending bird, such as the Chinese
goose or the pigeon with a knob on its nose, we find
the male grows a bigger one. If, on the other hand,
Nature has been beforehand with us in bestowing
the decorations, such as the comb and watitles of the
fowl and the bare red face of the Muscovy duck, and

THE ORIOLE. 49

we take the birds into domestication, we find that
the females, in which these decorations were
rudimentary or absent, proceed to develop them in
imitation of their lords, quite independently of our
selection. And if we deliberately breed for big-
combed fowls, the hens will run the cocks very close
indeed in the matter of head-dress.

But to get back to our Orioles ; their young are
cradled in an excellent nest, cup-shaped and firmly
laced into a fork high up in a tree, and they emerged
from white eggs spotted with black, this type of egg
being a family one with them. They feed on fruit.
and insects, and are thorough tree-birds, never
seen on the ground, and not making themselves.
conspicuous when perched. The chief indication of
the Oriole’s presence among us is his beautiful liquid
whistle, and the occasional appearance of the bird:
in his leisurely flight from one tree to another. Such
are the habits of Orioles in general, and they seem
a thriving race, for they spread from Australia to.
the British Isles, where one species, the Golden
Oriole (Oriolus galbula), an even more beautiful bird
than the subject of this article, has bred, but cannot.
establish itself on account of persecution. This
Oriole is a rare winter-visitor to our North-West, but
has a resident relative ranging all over India, which
closely resembles it—the yellow-headed mango-bird

F, BC 4

50 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

(Oriolus kundoo). Both have yellow instead of black
heads, and only differ in some slight details of
marking, and in the fact that the migratory bird
has, as one -would expect, longer wings. I don’t
remember ever seeing this mango-bird in Calcutta,
but it is very likely to occur here. The black-headed
species has an even wider range than the Indian
Golden Oriole, for it extends into Burma as far as
Tenasserim, In Southern India and Ceylon it gets
smaller and has the black wings less varied. with
yellow than is the case here; but Orioles do not give
much scope for variation—they are just yellow and
black birds as a rule, and there is an end of it. It is
a curious fact that, although their food seems simple
enough, Orioles don’t bear confinement well, our
black-headed one especially, and one seldom sees
them caged. Our only species which is not black
and yellow, the Maroon Oriole (Oriolus trailliz) of the
hills, is an exception and will thrive and keep in good
condition where the golden birds would be miserable
scare-crows. Although the Orioles have such a wide
range in the Old World, they have never penetrated
into the New, the American birds commonly so called
really belonging to a very different family, the
Troupials. They reproduce the real Oriole colours
and pattern to a remarkable extent but are different
in form and habits, being in these respects somewhat

THE ORIOLE. 51

intermediate between a starling and a weaver-bird,
while the real Orioles have a form and style peculiarly
their own. It must be confessed that the American
birds are much more interesting ; they also tend to
range northwards more than do the Old World
Orioles, and hence help to enliven the United States
to a very great extent, some of the most brilliant and
common birds there belonging to this troupial family.
We might have more brilliant birds in England if
we could only let them alone ; I have already alluded
to the persecution of our one Oriole, and even the
green woodpecker is oftener seen in a bird stuffer’s
shop window than on a tree in the open! As the
Oriole is one of the brightest birds J am dealing with,
I may perhaps be allowed to conclude with an
eamest appeal to all Anglo-Indians to help in the
preservation of beautiful birds, which exist in every
country under difficulties, both from natural enemies
and from man. The plain-coloured species can take
care of themselves out here at any rate ; but beauty
is everywhere a fatal gift to the lower animals, and
it is very much to be hoped that the recent enactment
will preserve against the export of skins the more
brilliant kinds whose danger is the greatest. Even
about Calcutta we have in the larger kingfisher, the
blue-jay, the golden-backed woodpecker, and the
subject of the present chapter, a quartette of birds

52 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

which would attract attention anywhere, and going
further afield fresh showy species present themselves
too numerous to mention in few words. Posterity
would not have thought much of us as a cultured
nation if we had allowed such creatures to be hunted
to extermination in countries under our rule, when
so many centuries ago Alexander the Great—in
India on a mere military expedition—gave orders
that the peafowl should not be molested, through
admiration of their beauty alone.

SALLE
Common Mynah.
" Acridotheres tristis,

VITIL—THE MYNAH.

“© T am not black in my heart, though yellow in my legs.”
—Shakespeare.

‘THE Mynah needs perhaps to make some apology for
his yellow stockings, since such mustard-coloured
understandings are not usual among small birds, per-
taining rather to the rapacious tribe, and being thus a
badge of anything but respectability. But the Mynah
atones for his yellow legs, feet, and face, by the exceed-
ingly decorous plumage which covers the rest of him ;
no objection can be made to his black hood, or the
sober chocolate of his body colour, or to the plain black,
diversified with white, of his quills and tail. It is no
wonder that Linneus probably having only: seen
a Mynah stuffed, and concluding from his general style

54 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

that he was some poor relation of the Bird of Paradise,
called him Tristis, the sad-coloured, for as a Paradisea
he did not show up well. He has long, however, been
degraded to his proper rank among the starlings, and
named with a happiness somewhat rare among ornitho-
logists. Acridotheres—the grasshopper-catcher—and
so heis likely to remain Acridotheres tristis till the end
of the chapter (the general rule being that a bird always.
bears the first specific name bestowed on it). Never-
theless as a starling our present subject is a rather big
and showy bird, being certainly equal in looks to any of
his relatives in Calcutta, none of which bear the shot-
silk sheen of green and purple which adorns the home
starling, also a visitor to India. For the starlings or
Mynahs are in great force in the East, which is their
true home, and the common Mynah is a good type of
theclan. Bold, vigorous, and pushing, he secures to
himself a large share of all good things in the way of
insects and fruit that may be going, and is a bird of
remarkably all-round abilities, though not particularly
graceful in his movements. On the ground he runsand
walks well, hopping when he wants to put on an extra
spurt, albeit there is a swing in his gait which is not.
particularly elegant. No doubt, however, he is proud
of this, as it is a family character ; geese, which do
not suffer from excessive modesty, have a similar
style of going, and are known to be redoubtable

THE. MYNAH. 55

pedestrians in their quiet way. But the Mynah,
unlike many ground-birds, is nimble and active in a tree
as well; and his flight, though not remarkably fast,
is tolerable enough for ease, and he feels sufficient
confidence in it to occasionally attempt a little
insect-catching on the wing, when his quarry has got
away from him on foot. When he flies, he tucks up
his long yellow shanks to his breast,@’showing
conclusively that birds which stow their legs this way
when on the wing do so by custom, not for
convenience ; for from their size one would think that
he would do better to stow them astern hke the
paddy-bird and other waders. The Mynah, like most
of the birds I have dealt with, goes in for equality
between the sexes in the matter of dress. You
can only tell a hen Mynah by her slightly smaller
form, and by her exemption from the amorous fits
which impel her spouse to now and then puff himself
out and bow grotesquely for her edification, mean-
while emitting various gurglings, presumably meant
to please her ear; the result being charmingly
uncertain, for with Mynahs as with men apparently

A glance of despair is no guide,

It may have its ridiculous side,

It may draw you a tear,

Or a box on the ear,

You can never be sure till you've tried,

56 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

At least I judge this to be the case from having
seen a Mynah pecked by his spouse for showing off, and
also the lady become suddenly kind for the same
reason apparently. The gentler sex in Mynahs have
no particular reason to make themselves too cheap,
for I have observed no less than three cocks bowing
and scraping after one hen, and doubtless amatory
rivalry will often account for the savage contests in
which one sometimes sees Mynahs indulge. In
other cases the possession of an eligible nesting site
will furnish a reason, for, like other birds that nest
in holes, the Mynah is sometimes hard put to it for
house-room. I remember once seeing a mynah-
fight in which two, no doubt the heads of families,
lay clenched as to their feet upon the ground, while
what were no doubt their wives looked on together
with certain crows, who had evidently been attracted,
like’ Mark Twain and his friends in Italy on a similar
occasion, by a disinterested desire to be allowed
“‘to help cord up the dead.” The crows, however,
were not officious beyond a nervous twitch at a com-
batant’s tail, for the Mynah is a good bird of his
hands, so to speak, and can make himself respected
even by a crow; indeed, the Market Sergeant told
me that he had once seen a crow nearly pecked to
death by a pair of these birds. The Mynah is indeed
a truly respectable character; ‘while offering a

THE MYNAH. ST

creditable resistance to aggression, he does not seem,
as a rule, to interfere with other birds, though I have
seen him clinging to the entrance of a sparrow’s nest
in a manner that betokened designs either on the
babies or the bedding ; I fear possibly the former,
since I have noticed a small house-lizard in a Mynah’s
bill, and from such a victim to a young bird is not a
very long step. At the same time, a Mynah likes
a warm nest, so perhaps a desire to borrow a little
upholstery was the real motive. The Mynah’s eggs
are of a cheerful light blue, like those of most
starlings, and his young, when fledged, are like himself,
but less brightly and distinctly marked. I have
seen young birds with brown heads, which may be
either a “sport ” or the result of the softer plumage
of the young getting sooner rusty on that part.
Mr. Aitken in Hume’s “ Nest and Eggs of Indian
Birds,” gives an interesting account of a pair of
Mynahs which in every alternate brood produced a
white young one. I have seen several white Mynahs
myself ; one in particular which Mr. Rutledge had was
very interesting, having assumed its natural colour at
the first moult—a contingency which is always
possible with albinos unless they have pink eyes.
On one occasion also I saw a bird in the Bazaar with
pale cinnamon body-plumage, and once the skin of
one such was submitted to me, which showed a

58 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

change to the normal colour actually going on by
moult. Abnormalities in Mynah complexion, there-
fore, may often be set down to individual weakness.
of constitution ; but the Mynah is a vigorous bird
as a rule, and given to enlarging his borders as a
species. Most of the Indian Empire, from Kashmir
to Mergui, is held by him, and he ascends the hills.
up to a very temperate climate, though I was
assured on good authority that he had only
penetrated to Darjeeling within the last twenty years.
Outside India man has helped him to a settlement
in the Andamans, Australia, New Zealand, and
Honolulu, but he is a bird which should be introduced
into a new country with caution, as he is too powerful
and too free a breeder to be allowed to increase
without checks, and in the last-mentioned place has.
rendered himself a decided nuisance by his aggressive
havits towards domestic birds, for he will turn out
pigeons without compunction ; and the disappear-
ance of the pretty little white Mynah (Sturnia anda-
manensis) from Ross Island in the Andamans is
doubtless due to his presence there, though it is
found on other islands and is sometimes brought for
sale to Calcutta. The Mynah has also wild relatives
here, notably the Bank Mynah (Acridotheres
ginginianus) with its grey body colour and buff facings,
set off by a red face and orange legs and bill, and the

ee

THE MYNAH. 59°

Jungle Mynah (Aethiopsar fuscus) which has the grey’
body and orange bill and legs of the bank species
with the white wing and tail marks of the common
one and differs from them both in being feathered
up to the eyes. One naturally does not expect a
simple jungle-bird to be so bare-faced as a denizen.
of cities. Much commoner is the sweet-voiced black
and white pied Mynah (Sturnopastor contra) with
its orange face and orange ivory-tipped bill, which
is much the most like our starling, but unlike starlings
generally builds a great untidy nest on a bough, as-
if to show that it fears no enemy ; and it certainly
ought not to find one in man, for its showy plumage,
beautiful, note, and harmless disposition, make it.
one of the best of our birds.

IX.—THE DHYAL.

A! Robyn, joly Robyn !—Old Ballad.

A “Rosyn,” as our ancestors called him, seems
strange at first in black and white instead of russet and
red ; but half-an-hour’s acquaintance with our Dhyal
(Copsychus saularis) will show that his English name
-of Magpie-robin was well bestowed. Nevertheless,
“this name has not gained much ground in England,
-where the Dhyal is occasionally seen as a cage-bird—a

THE DHYAL. 61

rare and much-prized one, it is true—and has even:
been bred in captivity. Here he is not very commonly:
held in durance vile}. chiefly, I suspect, because
of the deservedly greater popularity of his gifted
kinsman, the Shama (Cittocincla macrura). This
is just as well, for thus more Dhyals are left to grace
our gardens with their beauty and song. For the
Dhyal is an exceptionally pretty bird ; he is just of a
nice size—intermediate between the English robin
and blackbirds; his pied plumage is striking, yet
tasteful ; and his movements are particularly graceful-
and animated. His mate also, although not exactly
resembling him like the home Cock Robin’s wife, is
nevertheless very nearly as pretty, merely showing
iron-grey in her plumage instead of black. She is.
much more retiring in her habits, and thus one sees
many more cock Dhyals than hens; though, of
course, it is also possible that the hens are actually
less numerous as well as less obtrusive. The
Dhyal can never be very abundant, for, beng a
purely insect-eating bird of no great travelling.
proclivities, he has to keep a hunting-ground to.
himself, and hence cannot afford to be sociable.
Thus, although he is one of our commonest birds,
his kind are merely found scattered about singly or
in pairs; and as with so many” pugnacious birds,
even the two sexes do not seem to be very warmly

62 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

attached, and are hardly ever close together, even
though they may inhabit the same garden in peace.
They need never leave it, for they are not particular
about nesting accommodation, building in any hole

‘in tree or wall. The eggs vary much in size and colour, |

‘but generally speaking resemble more or less those
of the English blackbird on a small scale. And in
connection with this, it is interesting to note the
resemblance in proportions, gait,.and gestures between
‘these birds; the two species show admirably that
the names “Thrush” and “ Robin,” like “ Duck”
and “Teal,” are largely only measures of size. If
the Dhyal were as big as the blackbird, everyone
would call it a thrush, but, as it is a good deal smaller
16 gets the other name. Young Dhyals show their
relationship to the thrushes by being marked with
buff on the breast and wings, though generally
speaking their plumage resembles that of their mother.
They seem tobe not difficult to rear and make nice
pets. The old Dhyal is said to be very hard to tame,
in spite of its confiding habits in a wild state ; but
my friend Mr. F. Groser has not only tamed a wild-
caught old bird, but bred from him in confinement.
Of course the great point is to supply abundance of
insect food, and this is not difficult in Calcutta, where
.shamas are so much kept that men make a trade of
breeding maggots and catching grass-hoppers for

a

THE DHYAL. o 63

their daily supply. At the same time, breeding the
Dhyal is distinctly a feather in any amateur’s cap,
while it also shows that the bird itself is ready to
* accept fresh conditions. Ina wild state it ranges,
indeed, over a very large territory, including all the
Indian Empire. It is, however, more especially a
plains bird, although it ascends the Himalayas up
to about 5,000 feet. At its eastern limits in South
Tenasserim the black in the wings and tail begins
to increase at the expense of the white, but not in
places where it is noticeable on a casual view.
Nowhere have I seen the Dhyal so common as in
Ross Island in the Andamans, where in the morning
the air is full of the music of these birds, and they
are to be seen everywhere and are particularly tame.
J really don’t know what they all live upon, for insects
were not at all plentiful as far as I could see when
I was there.

T have not noticed the Dhyal’s music in Calcutta,
but he does not get much chance there with the noise
constantly kept up by the kites and crows. But he
is certainly one of the birds which give the lie to the
oft-repeated assertion that Indian birds have no
song. Another is his cousin, the shama above
mentioned, which is probably more numerous in

~ eages than the Dhyal is in the wild state. The shama
is a smaller bird than the Dhyal, but has a longer

64 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

black and white tail and a bright chestnut stomach,
so that he shows three colours. He has a voice of
great power and much variety of note, andis far
superior to any European singing bird, except the
nightingale. As he thrives so well in confinement,
he has long been popular in India, and a good many
are now even sent home annually. The shama is
not found wild near Calcutta, and would not come
into the town if he were, being, like the nightingale,
rather a woodland than a garden bird ; but being so
nearly related to our pied songster, and so familiar a
captive to boot, it is hardly possible to leave him out
of consideration.

But a bird closely related to the true European.
robin occurs in a wild state as well as the Dhyal and
thus deserves mention. This is the Red-breasted
Flycatcher (Siphia albicilla) a winter visitant. When
he comes to us his red breast is wanting or not much
in evidence, but except for this he is very like the
English favourite, except that he has longer wings
and shorter legs, shows some white on the tail, and
is smaller altogether. This sounds as if the resem-
blance were not very close, but the general attitude
and style of the bird make it so. As a matter of fact,
flycatchers and robins are very near relatives indeed ;
the red-breasted flycatcher being one of the links
between the two, and still retaining the habit of his.

THE DHYAL. 65

robin relatives of frequently coming to the ground,
which the more thorough-paced flycatchers have
discarded. The real home of our little bird is in
North-East Asia, for he leaves us as the hot
weather comes in, like so many other birds both great
and small. So, although he has just as much right
to the title of robin as the Dhyal, so far as appearances
go, his absenteeism during most of the year may
fairly bar his claim.

As for the Dhyal, he is such a nice bird in every
way that I think some attempts should be made to
encourage him to increase and multiply to a greater
extent. Suitable house accommodation in the shape
of large jomts of bamboo put up near his usual haunts
and in places inaccessible to enemies, and a few
cockroaches or crickets put out where he can easily
catch them, would probably make him very ready
to enter into friendly relations with the giver of such
kind assistance, and then we should have a better
chance of appreciating his good qualities than is
afforded us at present.

X.—THE SPARROW.

“* Look now to little Philip Sparrow.” —Old Ballad.

Way not? Philip himself would certainly say.
Once he must have been considered a friend of man,
for his nickname, derived doubtless from his note,
is the earliest%known to have been given to any bird,
though now not in use, while Tom Tit, Mag Pie, and
Jack Daw have been allowed to retain theirs ; to say
nothing of the redbreast, whose real name has been
quite dropped in favour of his pet name of “ Robin.”
But Philip has brought his unpopularity on himself ;
no doubt in England in the old days when crows and
kites and other enemies, then more numerous, exer-
cised on him the wholesome influence that they do
in India, he was not sufficiently numerous to be a
nuisance, and so from his familiar habits was looked
on rather with a kindly eye. Ofcourse I don’t mean
to imply that crows and kites keep Sparrows down
by catching and eating old ones ; the sublime indiffer-
ence of the Sparrow in their presence is sufficient
proof of thecontrary. But they exercise a rigid
supervision over all young birds. Iremember actually
seeing once a young Sparrow met on its entrance

THE SPARROW. 67

into the outside world on my verandah by three
crows, who no doubt succeeded in helping it to a
speedy exit ; moreover,, the crow prevents the Sparrow
from making those huge untidy nests in trees in which
his soul delights at home; in India he has to stick
rigidly to holes in buildings if he wants to be safe.
It is only due to Philip to say that he is a most
affectionate father, and will do his utmost to warn his
young of danger, flying. with it and chattermg in
the most impressive way when its safety is threatened ;
and I have been reproached for days: by a cock-
sparrow whose offspring I had destroyed. For I
think it a wise proceeding to kill, on principle, every
Sparrow I can get hold of, and to encourage others
todothesame. There can be no doubt that whatever
his function in the world in primitive times, Philip
has now outlived his usefulness, and that to a very
great extent. No bird is such a thorough and
unmitigated pest; field and garden produce suffers
terribly trom his attacks, and the insect diet he pro-
vides for his young cannot fairly be taken as a set-off
for this, especially when it is considered that in his
absence such insects would be taken by better birds
than he, which would not levy toll on the crops as
well. And the Sparrow is only too well-known
as an enemy of all other birds which he can induce
to vacate his vicinity by single or combined attack,

68 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

or, if violence fails, by persistent mobbing and vocal
annoyance. In India and in Europe, where he is a
native, we do not see much of this, for he and his
various feathered associates have had ages in which to
settle matters and “shake down ” together ; but n
North America, where he was introduced half a
century ago, his unpleasant peculiarities have been.
only too evident, and the native birds have been
forced to retire from the vicinity of human habitations.
in almost every case ; while even in the Old World, his
hostility to our traditional allies, the beautiful and
harmless swallow tribe, is still only too evident, and
would of itself be a sufficient reason for his execution.

Of course it will be said that even Sparrows have
their use in the economy of nature and should not be
thoughtlessly wiped out ; but there is no more pro-
bability of actually extirpating Philip than of arriving
at the same consummation in the case of rats and.
mice, creatures of similar tendencies in the way of
uninvited domesticity. And the work of Sparrows,
whatever it may be, is equally well performed by the
Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus), a prettier bird than
Passer domesticus, as anyone may observe at Dar-
jeeling, where, as in Japan and in some other parts
of the world, the Tree Sparrow is the house-frequent-
ing species. It can easily be distinguished from
the house-sparrow by the fact that both male and

THE SPARROW. 69

female are like the male domestic bird, though slightly
smaller and having a chocolate crown instead of a
grey one, to say nothing of some minor points of
difference. This bird is evidently a mountaineer and
forester on account of eligible city sites being barred
to it in so many places by its stronger relative ; for
when, as happened in one case, both were introduced
together into the United States, it was found that
Passer domesticus soon crowded out his weaker
relative, which, besides being smaller, is much less
pugnacious, and not given to annoying other birds ;
likewise being a less free breeder, its capacities for
mischievous increase are far more limited, not the
least item in “ Philip’s ” objectionableness being his
appealing powers of propagation. Were he, indeed,
a less prolific bird, no one would have a word to
say against him, for in many respects he is deserving
of the greatest admiration. Seen, as we see him
in India, unsoiled by English town smoke, he is
really a pretty bird in his way—a fact of which one
might think him to be fully conscious, judging
from the persistency with which he displays his
charms before his plainly-attired spouse, who is
just as likely as not to peck him for his pains. No
doubt he deserves it, for he does not. seem to be
addicted tothose gentlemanly attentions of combing
his wife’s hair and offering her titbits which are

70 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

favoured by better-bred birds, although an ardent.
admirer of the sex, which generally seems to be
teterruma causa belli with his race. And courage
is certainly another good quality to be put down
to Philip’s credit. Alike ina single-hand fight, and
in backing up a friend, he will give a good account
of himself, while the same dogged tenacity has won
the reluctant admiration of&his unwillmg American
hosts when displayed in his unremitting care of his
young, which he will do his best to start in the world
at all costs even when handicapped by the loss of a
partner, or by the unseasonable accident of a young
hopeful having fallen out of the nest when too
unfledged to be got back to it ; other birds in such a case
would often give up such a child as deserving its fate,
but the despised Sparrow will stick to him and pull
him through. Then again, Philip is a practical
philosopher ; although, unlike most finches, he has
no song, he is always cheerful ; one of the most versatile
of birds, he will eat anything, wallow in sand or wash
in water, nest anywhere, and stand any climate ; for,
as anyone cap see, he bears the Indian heat as well
as most other birds, while in the States it seems that
his high northern range is limited, not so much by
direct effect of cold itself as by the circumstance
that it freezes the horse-droppings, on which city
Sparrows depend for food to so large an extent.

THE SPARROW. 71

Nor are cities a necessity for his existence ; in New
Zealand, where he is now the commonest bird, he
has pushed his way into the wilds, and thrives far
away from civilization, having even learnt to burrow
nest-holes like a sand-martin in some cases. Neither
New Zealand nor Australia, however, regard him as.
a desirable colonist, and in fact it is his long tale
of virtues and his strong and independent character
which make him so objectionable. His readiness
to be accommodated with food and lodging make
him an economic pest and an obtrusive co-tenant
of our roofs; his courage degenerates constantly
into vulgar bullying, while such philoprogenitive-
ness as his would probably in course of time make
any, even the mildest mannered and least obtrusive,
bird into a nuisance. It is the fact that insect-eating
birds cannot, however prolific, ncrease beyond a
certain limit obviously imposed by their food, that
makes it reasonable to recommend the continual
suppression of Philip to give them more scope.

Yin”
‘
r ey HS

XI.—THE HONEYSUCKER.
“ For he on honey-dew hath fed.”’—Coleridge.

A DIET of sweets appears to have a marked effect
on the bird constitution, marvellously invigorating
the same instead of enervating it as one might expect.
It would be difficult to find a livelier little bird than
our common yellow-bellied or Amethyst-rumped
Honeysucker (Arachnechthra zeylonica), or one more
fearless and energetic. With his yellow waistcoat
set off by a red velvet coat and green satin cap, he
is the gayest of all our birds in dress, and as he is

THE HONEYSUCKER. 73

‘very tame you can get near enough to appreciate his
beauty. His little olive-green mate, who keeps only
‘the yellow vest of all her husband’s brilliant attire,
is usually with him, and together they merrily take
their meals, of insects with sweet sauce, from the
flowers, flirting their wings up and down as they hop
about. For, unlike the true humming-birds of the
New World, with which they are so often confounded,
‘the Honeysuckers or Sun-birds do not feed on the
wing, unless quite exceptionally, but skip from twig to
twig like other little birds. At the same time they
are strong and bold flyers for such tiny creatures,
and, although they have the bounding flight common
to most small fry in feathers, will fearlessly mount
high in the air and go off for a distant point as
readily as a mynah or a crow. Like other honey-
feeding birds, they are remarkable for courage; I
have heard of one which was long kept successfully
in an aviary, and asserted his authority therein over
a number of inmates larger than himself. And I
myself have seen a weakly bird, which had been
seized by a Brown Shrike (Lanius cristatus), defend
himself bravely against his ruffianly adversary, though
whether he escaped altogether I cannot say.

It is very probable that the reason for the courage
and activity of honey-feeders lies in their mode of
life; they must be very active to obtain a sufficient

74 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

quantity of their comparatively innutritious food
whether they do so by hovering bee-like like the
American -“ hummers,” or by perching and clinging
on slender twigs, like our birds and the much larger
Australian honey-birds. And in addition they need a
long-pointed bill to run into the flowers, which in case
of need becomes a bayonet-like weapon against any
other bird. Our little Honeysucker’s tongue is also
long, and split into filaments at the tip and tubular
in form, so as to suck up the liquid nectar. So fond
is he of sweets, and so fearless, that a captured bird
will readily sip up syrup if he be held in the hand
and his bill dipped into the liquid. Indeed, for a
short time the Honeysucker will appear contented
enough in confinement, and continually give out
his lively ittle song of “ Chi-chit, chit-che-wee,”
as if he were at liberty. But unless he be provided
with insect-food in addition to honey, he will not
survive very long, for his dinner must include a course
of meat as well as sweets. And in any case, I hope
none of my readers will cage this dear little bird
unless for purposes of export to Europe or elsewhere,
for so harmless and happy a little being should be left
alone in his native country as much as possible ;
though it is, I think, quite legitimate to cage such
birds in order to give people who cannot see them
wild some idea of what they are like in life.

THE HONEYSUCKER. 15

When the Honeysucker’s fancy lightly turns to
thoughts of love, the pair construct a very curious:
little nest of cobwebs and rubbish, oval in shape
with the entrance-hole at the side surmounted by an
eave or porch. This is hung at the end of a twig,
sometimes quite low down; I remember one in the
Bengal Club compound which could have been reached
with the hand. On account of the nature of the
materials of which it is made it does not particularly
strike the eye as a nest at all, and no doubt its
situation at the end of such an exiguous support serves.
as a protection against enemies if it does happen
to draw their attention. Only two eggs are laid,.
white speckled with drab; and the young male
birds are at first very like their mother. I knew
of two being reared by hand in Calcutta by a very
painstaking fancier, who kept them successfully till
they had attained their full beauty of plumage, and
for some time after that.

This species of Honeysucker is confined to India
and Ceylon, and is certainly much the commonest
kind in Calcutta. But it has a relative in India
which is also frequently to be seen, and is to my
mind even a handsomer bird, though less varied
in hues. This is the Purple Honeysucker (Arach-
nechthra asiatica); a bird of about the same size as
that which I have been discussing, but with a.

16 THE BIRDS OF CALCUITA.

‘proportionately bigger bill, both longer and stouter
although maintaining the curved and slender form
so characteristic of tkese birds.

The male of this species is clad throughout in rich
metallic purple, set off by a flame-coloured tuft
under each armpit which is ordinarily concealed by the
wings. It projects, however, when the bird is
‘settled for repose, and is, I believe, shown off in
courtship.

The hen is olive and yellow like that of the yellow-
bellied species, but she can easily be distinguished
by her bigger bill, and by having a yellow throat as
well as breast ; the throat in the hen of the commoner
bird being of a dirty white, not yellow. The Purple
-cock apparently thinks his wedding garment too
expensive to be worn the whole year round ; for after
nesting he doffs it, and assumes female plumage,
retaining only a purple streak from chain to stomach
as a mark of his sex. The young cocks are at first
like the hen, not having even this distinctive mark.

This species of Honeysucker is a quieter and less
sociable bird than the other; he is commonly seen
alone, has a great fancy for particular spots, and
-does not flirt his wings like his rival. He is, however,
a much better songster, being nearly equal to a
‘Canary ; and sings much merely to amuse himself. I
-well remember one bird which came to the Museum

THE HONEYSUCKER. 17

compound after breeding to change his plumage ;.
he kept very much to two or three trees, singing,
apparently, from one particular twig, and even when.
in undress he kept up his song. The Purple Honey-
sucker has a much Wider range than the other, being
found from Persia to Cochin China, and it also ascends.
further up the hills. It is, therefore, evidently, a
more hardy and adaptable bird ; and as its ordinary
feeding and nesting habits are the same as those of
the other species, I do not quite understand why it is-
not so common in Calcutta. Very probably, however,
its more lively relative’s competition is too much for:
it there. I certainly noticed that one bird, which
I took alive to the London Zoo some years ago,
seemed afraid of the yellow-bellied birds confined
with him, all of which succumbed on the journey— ‘
the last one distinctly bullying his dark companion.
Other people have since repeated my experiment-
with the purple kind, and I believe this would thrive
in the open in Southern Europe if turned out there ;-
a more charming ornament to a garden it would be-
difficult to find.

Gold-backed Woodpecker.

(Brachyplernus aurantius.)

XII.—THE WOODPECKER.

“The golden woodpecker...... laughs loud at
nothing.” —Hurdis.

Ir would appear that a propensity for irrespon-
sible and irrelevant hilarity is widely spread in the
Woodpecker family ; for the species alluded to by
the worthy author of the “ Village Curate” is the
English Green Woodpecker (Gecinus viridis)—a bird
which can hardly even by a stretch of the poetical
imagination be called golden, by the way. Our
own common Calcutta Woodpecker (Brachypternus

THE WOODPECKER. 79

aurantius) is just as unseasonably jovial. He is
jolliest when on the wing ; if you watch after hearing
his ringing cackle, you will generally be rewarded
by a sight of his somewhat ungainly form, as, with
head outstretched and legs drawn up, he progresses
with his curious flight—first a flutter and then a dip
with closed wings—to some tree-trunks which he
intends to explore. He is not shy, and will
readily permit you to admire his old-gold back
and scarlet crest as he hitches himself up the ,
bark, sounding for insects as he goes. His motto
is ever excelsior, for Woodpeckers always work
upwards, though they can slip down backwards
or laterally round the trunk of their tree if they wish.
The foot of the Woodpecker, with the toes in pairs
is supposed to be especially fitted for this kind of
travelling. But this is open to doubt; some other
birds which do not climb, like the Woodpeckers, near
relatives the barbets, have the same arrangement ;
and if it be so convenient for a climbing bird to have
two toes behind instead of one, why are the Wood-
peckers as a family gradually getting rid of the inner
hind toe? This is always smaller than the outer one,
and not unfrequently absent altogether; while in
some species, as in the Golden-backed one under
discussion, the toe is there indeed, but in the form of a
tiny useless vestige that has to be looked for carefully.

80 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

There are other points in our feathered carpenter’s.

structure, however, about the usefulness of which
‘no doubt can exist. His stiff wiry tail, which is never
cocked up as it is by other birds, is a most admirable
prop to support him as he clings vertically to the
tree, and his hard chisel-tipped beak contains a most.
curious tongue, long and worm-like, and armed with
a many-barbed horny tip. This he can shoot out”
with great facility to some distance, as its base is
supported by a pair of bony springs ; and altogether:
it is an admirable instrument for exploring crevices.
and persuading any grub which may lie hid therein.
to come out to dinner.’

It is also useful in enabling the bird to lick up the
juice of soft fruit, though whether this forms part of
his diet in a wild state I cannot say. Probably it does,
as it seems very acceptable im captivity, a condition.
to which this species is readily reconciled—at any
rate if taken young. A young Woodpecker, indeed,
makes a very interesting pet in several ways. Like a
young barbet, it possesses a warty pad on the hocks,
and shuffles about thereon for some time, not getting
really on to its feet till it is full-fledged. It is not.
till then, too, that the curious arrow tip of the tongue
is fully developed—this being at first devoid of barbs,
The first plumage, however, which springs from a.
skin unclothed by any baby-garment of down, is just.

THE WOODPECKER. 81

as bright as that of the old birds, and indicates the
sex of its wearer at once—a very rare case among
birds. For the young hen Woodpecker has her
forehead black, sometimes speckled with white like
her mother’s, while in father and son the red of the
crest runs forward right up to the beak. How young
Woodpeckers get on in their close quarters in a hole
hewed out by the parents I don’t know, but their tem-
pers must suffer considerably by enforced restraint,
for I have seen brother and sister fight savagely
in captivity while still fledglngs. Nor do the birds
seem ai all sociable in their habits when wild ; indeed,
one does not usually see even a pair together.
Business is business, and a hard-working bird like
a Woodpecker has no time to spare for social
amenities.

Laborious as the lives of Woodpeckers seem to be,
however, they area thriving clan, and are spread
all over the world except in the Australian region,
from the icy pine-forests of the Arctic regions to the
warm damp jungles of South America.

The Golden-backed Woodpecker has not so wide
a Tange as some other species, but it is still a very
numerous bird, being found all over India except in
the higher hills. It varies to a certain extent with
locality, like so many other Indian birds, Sind spe-
cimens being paler and South Indian ones darker
F, BC 6

82 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

than the type found in Calcutta. There is a certain
amount of individual variation also; the black-and-
white waistcoat of some birds is darker than that of
others, and the golden mantle may show a strong
tinge of red. In fact, if extreme forms be taken, two
or three species can be made out of our present
subject.

It is more interesting, however, to note that the
plumage of this species is very nearly reproduced
by two others, one of which (Chrysocolaptes gutti-
cristatus) has a well-developed inner hind-toe, while
the other (Tiga javanensis) has none at all; so that
the common Golden-backed Woodpecker forms the
middle term in this series of degenerates, and is
a fine example of a ‘missing lnk” still existing,
to use a rather Hibernian expression. It is very
remarkable, indeed, that Woodpeckers should be so
undecided in the matter of toes ; as I implied above,
the reason is not easy to find, as generally speaking
they are so very uniform in structure and habits.
All agree in laying white eggs, and in refusing to
wear any shade of blue in their plumage, and most
are inveterate woodlanders ; for the Ground Wood-
pecker (Colaptes campestris) of the South American
Pampas has gladly turned his attention to trees now
that they have been planted on his native plains. In
fact, his enthusiastic carpentering performed on the

THE WOODPECKER, 83

as yet none too luxuriant plantations has rendered
him rather an economic pest, unlike the majority of
the family. For Woodpeckers are, generally speaking,
among the most useful of birds, attacking the
destructive woodboring insects which few other species
an reach, and serving as a wholesome check on the
industrious ant, which in the East finds so many ways
of exercising its ingenuity to our discomfort.

|

Blue-cheeked Barbet.’
(Cyanops astatica.)

XIII.—THE COPPERSMITH.

“ Only the song of @ secret bird.”—Swinburne.

Vox et preterea nihil, indeed, is Xantholema hema-
tocephala to most of us; for though many, vexed by
his monotonous music through the blazing weather
in which he delights, may have exclaimed with the
apostle “ Alexander the Coppersmith hath wrought
me much evil,” few have seen him face to face. Nor
can one reasonably be expected to see a pudgy little
green bird, not much bigger than a sparrow, with
distinct ventriloquial proclivities, and an aspiring.

aoaade

THE COPPERSMITH. 85

spirit which leads him to prefer tall trees to bushes.
Nevertheless, Alexander sometimes descends lower,
and then one may see and admire his coral feet and
crimson and primrose head-marking, and realize
that a bird which would be striking in any country
is really one of our commonest citizens, for when
once you know him by sight you may see him almost
anywhere, even in the trees in the streets ; while long
before his personal acquaintance is made his continual
“ tonk-tonk-tonk,” repeated indefinitely like the tick
of grandfather’s clock, attests his ubiquity. Even
in the cold weather he will tune up. at times, but he
does not really do himself justice till it gets warm,
though he feels the heat as much as other birds, for
I have caught him gasping for breath like any crow.
No doubt, as he is an energetic little bird, he is
often scant of breath, for like all the barbet family
to which he belongs, he is of a somewhat clumsy
build, and not adapted for active exercise in a warm
climate. Nevertheless he thrives exceedingly ; his
food, of wild fruits, is abundant, and he can peck
out a home in any old tree ; barbets, like woodpeckers,
excavating their own quarters, and nobly despising
any luxury in the form of bedding within. Both
barbets and woodpeckers have the toes in pairs like
a parrot’s, two in front and two behind, which, as
stated above, has been cited in the case of the latter

&

86 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

birds as a beautiful adaptation for climbing; but
as nuthatches climb better than Woodpeckers with
toes of the ordinary three-to-one arrangement, and
as barbets don’t climb at all, but just hop, that
theory is insufficient.

One very puzzling point about the Coppersmith
is his whiskers. His stout black bill is garnished
with a sort of straggly moustache of the “ cricketer ”
type—eleven a side—which does not appear to be
either ornamental or useful. Both sexes have it,
the female Coppersmith being in all respects like her
mate, and.it is common to many other barbets, but
not to all; though such whiskers crop up again in
other birds of quite different families, These are
generally insect-eaters, but some barbets which do
eat insects are clean-shaven ones, so no connection
with that habit will account for Alexander’s hirsute-
ness. In fact the use of the “rictal bristles,” as
ornithologists call such appendages, is one of the
puzzles. presented by birds which have not as yet
been solved. Young barbets, like young woodpeckers,
do not move about on their toes, but on their heels,
and they have asimilar hard heel-pad to protect
the joint and give them a grip ; when they are fledged
and hop about it gradually disappears. Another
curious trick of Alexander’s family is their ingenious
custom of turning their tails over their backs, beneath

THE COPPERSMITH. 87

the wings, when pigging together in their very limited
quarters, obviously to economise space. They never
quite get out of the habit, for though a barbet most
steadily keeps his tail pointed down in the daytime,
at night he forgets himself and the unruly appendage
makes a wild attempt to turn over as in childhood’s
days, but cannot get further than an angle of forty-
five degrees. The big Himalayan Barbet (Megalema
marshallcrum), however, has mastered the difficulty,
and can keep his tail properly drooping like any
ordinary birds. ‘To return to the little Coppersmiths,
they emerge from white eggs, and are presumably
quite nude at first, though I have never seen'any so
young ; when the fledge off they show no red colour
anywhere, being merely green with yellow faces and
flesh-coloured feet. They are extremely easy to rear
on plantain cut up and administered with a quill,
and very readily learn to peck for themselves as soon
as fledged. It is very curious indeed, that the
dealers have never taken them up as they have the
larger Blue-cheeked Barbet (Cyanops asiatica), of
which more anon. The fact is, that the Coppersmith,
although he will eat it, cannot live on the universal
pea-meal paste, but will die in a few days if allowed
to devour the unwholesome mess. But give him
his natural fruit diet, and he will live well, even if
caught wild; and hand-reared birds, at all events‘

88 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

will thrive on bread-and-milk also. I knew one
such which could not ultimately be distinguished
in beauty of plumage from a wild bird, though on
its first assumption of the adult plumage it was less
brilliant. This bird’s brother distinguished himself
by a very intelligent performance. He watched
his opportunity and darted out when the door of
the aviary was opened, but returned in a day or so,
to stay contented for a short time and then repeat
his sudden exit, this time never to return. It looked
as if he were taking his bearings and learning how to
get a living before he made up his mind to go off
altogether. The Coppersmith seems to make an
intelligent and interesting pet if hand-reared, but he
is not sociable with other birds, though not aggressive.
But, like Hannibal Chollop, he requires a clear space
round him, and if he be crowded either with his own
species or with other birds, there will be trouble, for
barbets are hard bitten birds and tenacious of what
they conceive to be their rights ; indeed a couple of
wild Coppersmith have been seen to fight till one
was quite worn out. Steady persistence, in fact,
seems to be the key-note of a barbet’s character,
whether it be calling, eating, or fighting; the young
birds start practising their note before they are fledged
and everyone knows with what relentless persistency
the old bird keeps up his banging on imaginary metal.

THE COPPERSMITH. 89

At his meals, too, the Coppersmith is quitely energetic,
eating a very large quantity for his size, as indeed
he needs to do, his diet seeming to be very imperfectly
assimilated, as is the case with many other fruit-
eating birds. A curious fact about the Coppersmith
is his liability to albinism, or rather lutinism, for the
pale forms of green birds are yellow, not white. A
beautiful specimen of a lutino Coppersmith was,
when this book was written, in the Calcutta Zoo,
and was interesting in that the red on the plumage
and legs persisted, although the bill was fleshy white,
and only a little of the green feathering was to be
seen, in the wings and tail mostly. Of course even
if these pallid birds could hold their own with the
normally coloured ones, they would still be at a
disadvantage in the struggle for existence, since their
colour would be no protection; but the red on the
present bird showed that it had moulted at least once,
and so managed to exist for a year at allevents. The
Coppersmith must, however, be a singularly successful
species, for it is not only very common but has a
wide range east of India to the Philippines. In
this respect it has the advantage of our other Calcutta
species, the Blue-cheeked Barbet above mentioned,
a very showy bird as large as a thrush, with sky-
blue in place of primrose-yellow on the cheeks and
throat. This bird is less common in Calcutta than

90 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

the Coppersmith, and is confined to India and Burma,
though it ranges higher up the hills than the smal
species. It is blessed with a better digestion and
temper than Alexander, and will assimilate pea-meal
brose successfully and stand crowding; and so it
gets frequently caged and sent to Europe. In fact-
a very tame bird of this kind, which lived for years
at the London Zoo, was the first barbet I ever saw
alive, and every now and then it turns up in a dealer’s
shop or a bird show. It is true that its “song of
colour ” pitched as it is in brilliant red, blue, and
green, rises to a shriek and that its triple call of
“ kuturruk”’ is about three times as monotonous as
Alexander’s foundry-work, so that its popularity as
a cage bird is never likely to be wide. Nevertheless
I must confess to a great liking for barbets ; their
form, if not beautiful, is quaint, and their colouring
gorgeous, if a little barbaric. Andas to the noise
they make, it is at least constant and consistent,
and has not the exasperating quality of intermittence
which is so annoying in some feathered vocalists, the
domestic fowl] for instance. The sturdy smith has
always been a popular character, and I hope such
may always be the case with his fellow artisan in
feathers.

a?

XIV._THE BLUE-JAY.

“A lovely bird, with azure wings.” —Byron.

One can hardly go on with the above quotation
and credit the subject of the present article with a
“song that said a thousand things,” for the Blue-
jay’s vocalizations are limited to adegree. Ordinarily,
as has been neatly remarked, he “ encourages.
himself in patience’’ by uttermg a sound like
“‘¢schok” at intervals, and more rarely he pomts.
his bill to heaven and his tail to earth and utters a
cackling laugh, in feeble imitation of the great.
Australian kingfisher, commonly known as the Laugh-

92 ~- THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

‘ing Jackass (Dacalo gigas). As a matter of tact, our
“present friend is more kingfisher than jay, this poverty
of vocabulary being one of the points in which the
relationship comes out ; real jays having a remarkable
flexibility of voice, though their ordinary remarks
are not much more musica! than those of the Roller
family, to which the Indian Blue-jay really belongs.
Rollers also agree with kingfishers and differ from
jays in several easily noticeable points of habit, to
say nothing of more recondite anatomical distinctions.
Thus, they extend their feet behind when fiying,
instead of drawing them up to the breast like the crow
‘tribe ; they bolt their food whole, never tearing it
with bill and foot like the real jay ; they are practi-
cally pure animal feeders, and do not lay up stores
against a time of scarcity, unlike the omnivorous and,
provident corvine jays; and most important of all,
they nest in holes and lay white eggs. It is this
-common confusion between two groups of birds very
well known in their respective habitats that makes
it excusable to include in this series a bird which is
not common in Calcutta by any means. In fact I was
personally acquainted with only one wild specimen,
who was generally to be seen on one of the
furlong posts of the race-course, just opposite the
jail. Hereabouts he spent most of his time, for
Rollers, again unlike the birds whose name they

THE BLUE-JAY. 93.

borrow, are very sedentary birds, waiting till they
see some small live thing and then pouncing upon it,.
instead of actively hunting about. As to the quality
of the game they are not very particular, for, as I have
proved with a captive bird, they will eat and digest
toads, which are a good deal too much for some birds’
insides. The Roller throws up the hard parts of its.
food in quids or pellets, like many other insectivorous
birds. Young Rollers are ugly little creatures at
first, being quite naked, but when the feathers.
have grown enough to cover the body they are very

pretty, their plumage, with the wings and tail banded

with Oxford and Cambridge blue, being like that of
their parents ; for, unlike many brilliant birds, the
Indian Roller has a common livery for all ages and.
both sexes. The large dark eyes also do not change:
with age, and give the young birds a singularly
innocent appearance, which rather belies their real.
disposition ; for they are greedy little creatures, and.
when hngry will fight violently over their food;
although I have seen a youngster which I had filled
up kindly present an extra piece to a brother fledgling..
Young Rollers are quite easy to rear if fed on raw
meat and cockroaches, and will grow up very tame..
But they are not interesting pets, for in a small cage
they beat and break their beautiful plumage, and.
in an aviary sit stillso much that they are not a very

94 THE*BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

great acquisition. Indeed, so sedentary are the
Roller’s ordinary habits,and so inconspicuous are
the pinky drab and sea-green of his plumage in repose,
that our American winter visitors have called him
“ the surprise bird,” in allusion to the startling display
of colour he gives as he takes wing, looking like a
great butterfly in his lazy flapping flight. Like
many of these weak-looking fliers, however, he is
really very active in the air, as might have been seen
in the case of the race-course habitué abovementioned
when he was badgered by the local crows, who seemed
to cherish a prejudice against him.

The Nilkant, as the Roller is called by the natives,
is with them a sacred bird, and once at least a throne
has been gained by the holy fowl—no doubt a trained
specimen—alighting on the successful candidate’s
head. And certainly if beauty deserves the honour
of worship, the Roller has full right to it, more espe-
cially as he is absolutely harmless ; for, when he does
fly, he is almost the most effective bird ore could
have in a landscape. Fortunately, although I fear
many have been killed for their plumage, the Roller
is, over a large part of this country, exceedingly
common, and extends westwards through Persia to
the Levant. Hereabouts he is on the confines of his
eastern range, for from about the longitude ot Calcutta
he begins to intermarry with the darker Burmese

THE BLUE-JAY. 95°

species, called by naturalists Coracias affinis, our
bird being Coracias indica, The Burmese bird is
rather larger than ours and very much darker in the
general tone of its plumage, although curiously
enough the tail is lighter, not having the purple band
at the tip which so well sets off that of the Indian
bird. The young, also, of the Burmese Roller are
different from the parents, being much lighter and
duller. This species must be found wild near Calcutta,
though I have never seen it even on the telegraph
wires by the railway ; but I have seen some more or
less pure Burmese specimens brought in, fresh-caught
for sale, and have successfully “ meated them off,”
as bird-fanciers say, together with the common bird.
For it is easy enough to get adult Rollers to feed in
confinement if you start them on cockroaches all—
more cr less—alive and kicking. Water they do not
constantly require, for they seldom appear to drink
when they have the chance, in this total abstinence
again resembling the kingfishers; but unlike those
birds they not only bathe, but wallow and shuffle in
dust like a fowl when they want a clean-up.

It is curious that, being so easy to keep in con-
finement, the Indian Roller has so seldom been sent
to England. Some time ago a well-known London
fancier of birds obtained a very seedy specimen from
a dealer, and more recently my friend Mr. E. W. Harper

96 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

of this city succeeded in sending one to the London
Zoo, where it is still in good health. The curious.
thing was that, though tame enough in Calcutta,
the bird became for a time very wild and nervous.
in London. But the very intelligent keeper who had
it in charge told me that he had found the European
Rollers, which he had had for some time in his care,
also very timid, and the same thing was noted about.
this latter species (Coracias garrula) by Bechstein in
- his work on cage birds more than a century ago ; so-
that possibly the peculiarity runs in the family. The
European Roller, which also occurs in the extreme
north-west of India, and comes to England frequently
to get shot and “ recorded,” is a migratory species,
with much more pale blue and less purple in its.
plumage than our “ Blue-jay.” Curiously enough, it
is sometimes called in German the Birch-jay, so that.
the superficial resemblance to the jay has struck
Europeans independently in two distant countries.
The Americans, however, do not seem to have been.
taken in, being no doubt too well acquainted with
their own Blue-jay (Cyanocitta cristata), which really
is in a literal sense what its name proclaims it to be.
There are no Rollers in America, and when Brother
Jonathan gets over the unreasonable horror of accli-
matization with which his too successful experiment.
with Philip Sparrow has filled him, he cannot do

THE BLUE-JAY. 97

i

better than set to work to supply the deficiency with
a big consignment of our lovely Indian species ; for
the Roller would not only be a great ornament to the
prairies, but a very useful ally in grass-hopper
vlagues.

F, BC 7

White-breasted Kingfisher.
(Halcyon smyrnensis.)

XV.—THE KINGFISHER.

** On the shore

The halcyons loved of Thetis spread their wings.” —
Virgil.

THERE seems to be some reason for suspecting

that the goddess’s pets were terns, not Kingfishers

after all; but nevertheless Aristotle describes a bird

as at any rate one sort of “ haleyon ” which certainly

could not have been anything else but a Kingfisher

THE KINGFISHER. 99

Moreover, in various parts of its wide range across the
Old World the Kingfisher often finds itself on the shore
and takes kindly enough to a diet of salt-water fish and
shrimps. But it is by rights a haunter of trees over-
hanging fresh water; its little coral feet, with the
front toes joined together by skin, are better suited
for perching than for walking, and all it ever does
in the way of pedestrianism is a very short waddle.
As it is not adapted for hopping about the twigs
either, and furthermore has not very long wings, it
wisely sits still on whatever point of vantage presents
itself, and thence plunges on its prey with a deter-
mined splash. If there is no suitable perch, it will
fly up and hover for a shorttime, but this more
laborious procedure it naturally does not adopt
if it can be avoided. Our little Indian Kingfisher has
sometimes been ranked as a distinct species from the
home bird (Alcedo ispida) and called Alcedo benga-
lensis ; but it really does not deserve such distinction,
being simply a rather undersized variety. That this
should be so is curious ; the Kingfishers are essentially
a tropical family, pushing out here and there hardy
pioneers into colder climates. And yet here we find
that the European bird, which too often starves to
death when winter lock up the fresh waters it
frequents, nevertheless has a finer physique than
when living in its native tropics, where food is almost

100 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

always plentiful. In another way the Kingfisher
is better off in the Hast, in that it is not much perse-
cuted by man, although even here far too many are
killed for their feathers. But it is not relentlessly
hunted down here as it is in England ; presumably
because bright birds are more numerous and destruc-
tive fools with guns less so. So our little halcyon is
as tame as a robin, and all the details of his daily life
may be watched. He is a great believer in “ spheres
of influence,” and seems to require a large tank all to
himself ; for if I saw another bird besides our usual
resident at the Museum tank, there was apt to be an
amount of tail-cocking and wing-drooping going on,
which argued matrimony in prospect, and hence the
tolerance of a stranger is explamed. Where the
burrow, in which their pinky white eggs are deposited
in due season, may be, I do not know ; but it is not
surprising that it should be some little distance off,
for Kingfishers often nest some distance away from
water. The half-fledged young are funny little
things, for their feathers grow to come length before
bursting their’ sheaths, so that the resulting
appearance rather suggests a miniature porcupine.
Moreover, they rival the Hibernian of fiction in their
ability to “advance backward,” a useful accom-
plishment to dwellers in holes. They fledge off into
a plumage not much inferior in brilliance to that of

THE KINGFISHER. 101

their parents, who, in their turn, each sport an azure
mantle and cinnamon breast, not being addicted to
invidious sexual distinctions in dress, though the
hen alone shows a red streak on the bill. But
brilliant as is the little Kingfisher, he is quite eclipsed
by his larger relative, the White-breasted species
{Halcyon smyrnensis). This bird is as big as a thrush
and is most richly attired in skyblue and chocolate,
set off by a white shirt-front and red bill and feet.
He is, in fact, quite the showiest bird we have in
Calcutta, and is more in evidence generally than
the small species, since he does not confine himself
to water, feeding on worms, grasshoppers, &c., as
well as aquatic prey. Indeed, he does not seem to
be much of a fisher, for when he does strike at
something in the water, he glides down slantingly
and touches the surface in a very half-hearted way,
although when taking his bath he dashes in boldly
enough. Obtrusive as he is in colours, he is still
more so in voice, and deems it necessary whenever
he takes wing to let the neighbourhood know he is
moving by uttering a loud unpleasant cackle. Occa-
sionally, presumably when under the infiuence of the
tender passion, he will fly erratically about uttering
a wailing note ; but his flight is not swift at any time,
and very different from the arrow-like progress of
his little kinsman. The two seem to get on all right

102 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

together, for they frequent the same tank in peace—
no doubt because their lines of business are not quite-
identical, as I remarked above. Although, however,
he is more or less of a Jack-of-all-trades for a King-
fisher, the white-breasted bird has not nearly so wide
a range as the little one, for, though found from
Cyprus to China, he is essentially a bird of warm
climates. His versatility is shown in his nesting-
habits as well as in his feeding, for though he usually
nests in a burrow like his family generally, he has.
been observed in Cachar to actually make a rough nest
of moss among rocks—a most anomalous habit ; for
Kingfishers, in addition to being burrowers, usually
despise all bedding, and allow the family to pig
together on a sort of mat of fish-bones which have
been cast up in “ quids” after the flesh has been.
digested.

In this larger Kingfisher, as in the other, male and
female have the same plumage, and the young merely
a rather duller one; but the beaks and feet of the
youngsters are blackish instead of red. The male,
when courting, makes a great display of his wings,
which have a fine white patch on the primary quills,
like the mynah’s; while the wing-covers are quite
diagrammatically coloured, the “ major ” being blue
the “ median ” black, and the “‘ minor ”’ chestnut—a
useful “tip” for anyone who wants to learn the

THE KINGFISHER. 103

topography of a bird’s wing according to the orni-
thological books. Halcyon smyrnensis bears captivity
very well, and has been exhibited both at the London
and the Calcutta Zoological Gardens.

There is a sort of larger edition of him, nearly as
big as a crow, which one may see as near as Alipore ;
this bird rejoices in the name of Pelargopsis gurial,
the Stork-billed Kingfisher. He is not as showy as
his smaller relatives, being buff and pale-blue in
colour, and has a curiously plaintive call for such a
big strong bird. He is a fish feeder, although in
form he resembles the White-breasted species more
than the liitle fisher, and likewise has a red bill. I
have never seen about Calcutta the pretty spotted
Pied Kingfisher (Ceryle varia), whose plumage always
reminds me of a silver-spangled Hamburgh fowl ;
but he is sure to be found not far off, for he is one of
our commonest Indian birds, and in a slightly different
form extends to Africa and Western Asia also.

Sometimes, however, one may see in Calcutta a
bird which, although not a Kingfisher, is nevertheless
a very near relative of that family, and therefore
ought not to be entirely passed over, especially as he
generally goes under an alias. This is the Green
Bee-eater (Merops viridis), commonly miscalled a
flycatcher. Theterm describes his way of getting a
living well enough, but in his general form, except that

104 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

he has a curved instead of a straight beak, and along
tail, he is very kingfisher-like. When in the hand,
it may be observed that his feet are of the same
peculiar make as those of Kingfishers, and he burrows
out a nest in the same manner, and lays similar eggs.
Bee-eaters are very nice little birds ; they are more
sociable than their relatives, and several sit about
together ; and they also breed in societies, making
a regular warren where they are numerous. Like
Philip Sparrow, also, they are among the few birds
which both dust themselves and bathe, which argues
an intelligent appreciation of all the simple pleasures
open to a bird. When dusting they, of course, have
to settle ; but they take their bath by a plunge like
a swallow. They are not constant residents in
Caleutta—at any rate one only notices them at certain
seasons, and then their pretty green plumage and
graceful flight make them very conspicuous.
Although one of the smallest of the family, being,
except for his long tail, only about as big as a sparrow,
the Green Bee-eater is a most prosperous species,
extending from North-East Africa to Cochin China,
As with so many wide-ranging birds, the Bee-eater’s
coat varies locally. In the North-West of India his
throat becomes more or less ‘blue, while in Burma
he frequently sports an auburn cap. This is an
example of one way in which species arise. If the

THE KINGFISHER. 105

pure-green strain died out on account of unfavourable
conditions, the blue-throated and chestnut-headed
varieties would be two distinct species. But of course
this does not explain how the different varieties
arose in the first place, which is the real problem
of the origin of species.

XVI._THE SWIFT.

“ True to the kindred points of heaven and
home.” —Wordsworth.

Wuat the gentle bard sang of the English sky-lark
is still more applicable to our long-winged, dusky
house-fellow who squeals and skims round the consti-
tuent buildings of “ The City of Palaces” much as.
his near relative does about English towns and
villages : for house-swifts hardly ever alight outside
their nests, and only go there to rest, sit, and sleep,
performing all the other functions of life on the wing.
The Indian Swift (Cypselus*afinis), indeed, is neither
so loud nor so speedy as the English one (Cypselus
apus) ; this, indeed, could hardly be expected of him
as he is not so large a bird ; but he is certainly prettier,
being greenish black instead of sooty brown, and with.
his dark hue set off by a patch of pure white above
‘the tail, which is not forked as in the home bird.
As in Swifts generally, there is no noticeable difference
between male and female ; and the young are merely
duller by reason of a light fringing to their feathers.
One has plenty of opportunities of studying them
as they are unusually happy at falling out of their

THE SWIFT. 107

stuffy nests, composed of all sorts of rubbish that the
parents can pick up on the wing and stick together
against some roof or in a crack with their gummy
saliva. Glutinous salivation is indeed a speciality
with the Swifts, and the celebrated birds’ nests of
which soup is made to gladden the hearts ot such
Chinese bigwigs as can afford to pay about its weight
in silver for the raw material are the product of certain
birds of this family who rely for their procreant.
cradles simply on unlimited expectoration ; those
which adulterate their secretion with feathers and
other extraneous substances producing a far less.
marketable article. The eggs of this Swift, like those
of its family, generally, are long and white, and few
in number, only two to four being laid ; the young are
nasty, naked, pink little things, at first blind, with
their little helpless wings no bigger than their legs ;.
then, as the feathers sprout, the wings predominate
by degrees, till inthe full-grown bird the puny legs.
only serve to carry the strong grappling claws which
the bird needs for scrambling about and hanging on.
in its confined nesting and roosting quarters. The
toes are not placed three in front and one behind, as.
in most ‘birds, but spread out anyhow like the
“ fingers ” of a starfish, and they grip very closely.
On one occasion I picked up in the Museum two birds,
presumably rival males, so tightly clenched by their

108 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

feet that they did not separate even when taken in
hand. The Swift seems, as might be expected with
such feet, not to be able to walk like other birds, but
only to crawl in a shuffling flat-footed fashion like
a nestling, with the hocks touching the ground ; and
T had to catch one and tie its wings to find this out,
for if you place a Swift on the ground he wastes no
time in pedestrianism on his own account, but jerks
himself into the air at once—if he can, for both this
species and the home Swift have been said to be
incapable of rising when once down. I have,
however, several times experimented with our bird
and with one exception always found uninjured
birds could get under way, even the two fighters I
mentioned above ; but I did get one specimen which
apparently could not start till I threw it up in the
air. It is not difficult to get hold of Swifts for
experiment, for of all the birds I have met with, the
Indian Swift is the best hand at getting into a scrape
ab any age; several times I have heard the piteous
squeals of one in the grip of a crow, and I once
extracted a wretched individual from a drain, too
weak to fly when he was released ; while getting
into a room, forgetting the way out, and:so circling
round hopelessly till he drops is quite the ordinary
thing for a Swift to do; I presume if he is driven
out of his nest he is altogether lost for the time.

THE SWIFT. 109

The Swift, indeed, does not compare at all favour-
ably for intelligence with the swallow, whose name
or nest he sometimes usurps. Into the anatomical
distinctions ‘between the two it is not my intention
here to enter ; but roughly Swifts may be distinguished
from swallows by having only ten instead of twelve
tail-feathers, or if one cannot catch them for the
purpose of noting this distinction, by the Swift’s
habits, noticed above, of not perching away from
home. The swallows sit both on dead twigs and
telegraph wires, and when they have occasion to
come to the ground for mud, can walk as much as
they want with their pretty little feet, which are just
miniatures of those of ordinary birds. But one does
not often see swallows in Calcutta to make: the
comparison, though our common Chimney Swallow
(Hirundo rustica),which also is found here, and breeds.
in the Himalayas, does turn up sometimes, especially
in the cold weather. Perhaps the Swifts have had
something to say in the matter, for, as I hinted above,
they are rather too much for swallows when the
interests of the two happen to clash, the swallow’s
nice mud nest being a great temptation to a dishonest
Swift. However, Swifts and swallows of numerous
species do exist out here together, so that probably
as a rule they do not get in each other’s way. The
English Swift, for instance, occur in the hills and

110 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Kashmir, and in Calcutta itself the little Palm Swift
(Tachornis batassiensis) may be found as well as the
House Swift. The Palm Swift is a considerably
smaller and slenderer bird than the domestic species,
with a well-forked tail and plain drab plumage all
over ; it is not a very rapid flyer, and keeps near the
palms, on the fronds of which it fastens its tiny cup-
like nest of plant-down or feather, stuck together
and fastened in one of the furrows of the leaf by
the usual salivary cement. There was a small
colony inhabiting a tall fan-palm in the Museum |
compound. +g

Wherever the fan-palm grows in India the Palm
Swilt takes up its abode, but the house bird, not
being so fastidious in its requirements, is at home
wherever there are clifis or buildings in Africa and
India, and the intervening countries ; indeed, I first
made its acquaintance at Mombasa in one of the
offices of the British East Africa Company nearly
a dozen years ago. Hast of India the House-Swift
is blacker and sports a longer forked tail, and so
claims rank as a distinct species (Cypselus subfurcatus),
but to go into the Swifts of the Indian region would
be getting too far away from the birds of Calcutta
altogether, so that I will confine myself to further
stating that the little producer of the best quality of
edible nests (Collocalie francica) breeds in the

THE SWIFT. lll

Andamans and Nicobars, though he wilfully refuses
to be civilized and inhabit houses; which is the
more vexatious as a near relative of his (Collocalia
lincht), who builds a nest so adulterated with moss
as to be quite worthless, has taken freely to buildings
at Port Blair, and can be studied there readily.
Perhaps transposing the eggs of the two species
might persuade the first class bird not to waste his
sweetness on the desert rocks, and they breed at the
same time ; so valuable a product ought to be worth
a little trouble in its cultivation. As for our humble
companion here, he is to be tolerated if not loved ;
it is difficult to get up much interest in Swifts, which
have never enjoyed the popularity of swallows ;
but think of what we might have to put up with in
the way of insects if he were not here to make at
least some impression on their numbers! For Swifts,
as every one probably knows, live on small winged
insects, and of all the places in which I have ever
lived, Calcutta is facile princeps in the production
of such amenities of existence.

Hen Koél.
(Ludynamts honorata.)

XVII.—THE KOEL.

“O Koél, little Koél, singing on the siris bough.” —
Kupling.

Ir is in my mind, as Mr. Kipling’s animal say, that
our Anglo-Indian laureate has in the above-quoted
passage grievously mixed up the Koél with the
Coppersmith, a miscreant dealt with earlier in this
series. For the Koél is not so very small as birds go,
being as big as a good sized pigeon, nor, though his

THE KOEL. 113:

“speech” is “ ceaseless ” enough in the season of his
vocalizations, is it ““bell-like”’; while the Coppersmith’s
metallic call might deserve such an epithet. I must
confess to being heretical about the Koél, who is
-not as a rule a popular character with the exile in
India whose fate Mr. Kipling so pathetically deplores..
No note among our English song birds’ utterances,
save only the lark’s or the nightingale’s, is to my ear
so pleasant as the “ kuk, kuk, ko-eel, ko-eel, ko-eel,”
running up the scale, with which Hudynamis honorata
warns us that the time to stew in our own juice is at.
hand. The natives, who enjoy the said culinary
process, love the Koél, and deem his jetty plumage.
a fit object with which to compare the locks of beauty,,.
even as European poets do the raven’s. They also.
evince their admiration of his song by keeping him.
caged, and he seems to do very well in confinement,
although he must find satoo—gram-meal paste—a
somewhat monotonous diet in place of his natural
fare of jungle fruits. However, the birds of the
cuckoo family, to which he belongs, have accom-
modating stomachs, so long as the food be soft and
plentiful, and the Koél especially must have a hardy
constitution to withstand the load of mixed garbage
with which his infant interior is presumably filled
by his natural foster-parent, the crow. It is much in
the Koél’s favour that after such an upbringing he
F, BC 8

114 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

reverts to vegetarianism ; and how he gets brought
up at all under the circumstances is somewhat of a
puzzle. There is no doubt whatever that crows
hate the old Koéls and persecute them literally to
the death when they get the chance ; nevertheless,
they perform a parent’s duties to their offspring
when once the supposititious bantling has been
safely foisted into the corvine nest. To get this
done the male Koél is said to show himself and draw
off pursuit while his mate, who is speckled like a hen
pheasant and not in the least like him, deposits her
egg where it is to receive parental attention. As
the said egg is very like a crow’s there is no great
‘ wonder that it should be hatched as if it were one ;
nor can a crow be expected to notice that the change-
ling’s toes are in pairs, not three in front and one
behind, as crows’ toes should properly be. But one
would expect that when the young bird is fledged
its appearance would provoke suspicion. It is
not so big as a young crow, and though it is some-
times as black as its real or foster-father it generally
betrays a certain speckling, more or less according
to its sex, of the plumage of its maternal parent ;
though even the lightest coloured young hen Koél,
by her dark bill and eyes, is easily distinguished from
her mother, whose ruby eyes and jade-green bill are
like those of her husband. Probably, by the time

7 THE KOEL. 115

that the hen crow awakes to the fact that she has
been “ sold again,” maternal affection—that powerful
force which makes cats foster rats, and wolves babies
—has asserted itself to such an extent that she cannot
bid the intruder begone.

It is sometimes stated, however, that the real
parent hangs about, so as to be ready in such a
contingency, and certainly there seems to be some
feeling of propriety among Koéls, in spite of their
disreputable family connexions. Ihave seen the male
take the trouble to feed the females with berries
plucked off the trees on which both were sitting ;
and I am not aware that even so small an act of
courtesy as this is has been recorded of the home
cuckoo. It is possible therefore that care of offspring
as well as attention to the conjugal tie is a little more
in evidence in the Indian bird.

Both our common crows, the urban and the
mofussilite, are victimized by the Koél, but the
former more frequently than the latter, probably
because the town crow is the smaller bird ; and as a
family upset by this cuculine intrusion is. almost
the only calamity crows have to fear from other
feathered members of creation, it is a great pity the
Koél is not commoner—though some people, who
object to the persistence of the sable vocalizer by
night as well as by day, would probably say there

116 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

are far too many of his kind about already. Such
have been known to confound the Koél with the
brain-fever bird, which, however, is a quite distinct
species, much more like the home cuckoo, and known

Brain-fever bird.

(Hierococcyx varius.)

in books as the Hawk-cuckoo (Hverococcyx varius)
from his remarkable resemblance in plumage and
general form and flight to the common indian
Sparrow-hawk or Shikra (Astur badws). His note,
however, fully entitles him to his ordinary desig-
nation, whether from its “damnable iteration ” or
from its remarkable resemblance to the word “ brain-
fever ” -repeated in a piercing voice running up the
scale ; although an equally worthy rendering of the
performance, which has the merit of including the
overture preceding the triple note, is, “O lor’!
O lor’! how very hot it’s getting—I feel it, I feel it,”’
&c., &e., &c. The brain-fever bird in youth is nurtured

THE KOEL. 117

?

by the “ seven sisters,” and in connection with his
resemblance to the shikra it may be noted that one
observer states that the whole sisterhood make
themselves scarce when Hierococcyx appears on the
scene, and thus give her a fair field for planting her
oval imposition on them. On the other hand, as has
been stated in the chapter dealing with those birds, the
shabby seven have been known to show a bold front
to the real enemy, and moreover the young brain-fever
bird is as similar to a young hawk as its parent is to
an old one; so that general rather than special
deception may be the object of this remarkable resem-
blanece, which occurs to a certain extent in many
parasitic cuckoos, including the familiar bird at home
(Cuculus canorus). This also occurs here, and may
be heard any spring day at Darjeeling, together
with a larger mountaineering relative of the brain-
fever bird (Hierococcyx sparverioides). India, indeed,
rejoices in a number of cuckoos, both of the sort
“* as doesn’t lay ’is own eggs ’isself,” and of the more
honest section who behave in domestic matters like
any ordinary bird. About Calcutta one may occa-
sionally meet, of the former kind, the handsome
black and white Crested Cuckoo (Coccystes jacobinus),
which the natives will call a bulbul, and of the latter,
the awkward looking Crow-pheasant (Centropus
sinensis) with its black body and tan wings, which

118 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

certainly does at first sight recall the two birds whose
name it bears rather than the ordinary members of
its real family. The Crow-pheasant is prescribed
in some places as an enemy to game, which, as his
general habits resemble those of a magpie, he probably
is ; but as he also destroys snakes, it would be better
to protect him stringently, since whatever harm he
may do to young pheasants or partridges would be
in most people’s opinion amply offset by warfare on
creatures which are their enemies and ours alike.

XVIII.—THE PARROT.

“ Fraught with antics as the Indian bird.””— Wordsworth.

Tue Parrot may fairly claim to be the Indian bird
par excellence, for the peacock and fowl had been so
long known in Europe, when he arrived to gladden
the hearts of Greek bird fanciers, that they had found
their way into mythology ; and we hardly think of
them as foreigners ourselves. But the Parrot, always
a captive and renowned for its power of speech, has
always remained a type of what is gorgeous, tropical,
and strange. Thisis right enough ina way, for Parrots
are very unlike any other birds, European or
otherwise, and they are pre-eminently characteristic
of warm regions all round the world. But India is
not rich in species of Parrots, nor Africa either ; the
great. haunts of these birds are South America
and the island continent of Australia and its
satellites. And here we see the hardiness of the
Parrot constitution ; a large parrakeet (Cyanolyseus
patagonus) haunts the bleak plains of Patagonia ;
a smaller one (Cyanorhamphus unicolor) crawls
among the tussock-grass on the remote Antipodes
Island, so much in fear of the violent winds

120 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

which sweep its home that it never takes wing ;
and it is only high up on the New Zealand
Alps that the great sheep-killing Kea (Nestor notabilis),
which looks as much like a buzzard as a Parrot,
makes its horrible meals off living sheep. It would
seem therefore that Parrots can live almost anywhere
and anyhow, given ground habitable by land-birds at
all; and this makes it the more curious that in those
most richly varied collections of animal life, the
African and Indian faunas, the Parrots make no very
great show. We have here no gorgeous lories or
macaws, no snowy and crested cockatoos—hardly
anything, in fact, but the long-tailed green parrakeets,
of which our common Ring-necked species (Paleornis
torquatus), is far the most abundant, and extends
all over India, spreading East to Cochin China. It
does not ascend the hills as a rule, and it likes culti-
vated ground, where it has the opportunity of using
holes in buildings, as well as in trees, for nesting
purposes, paying for the accommodation afforded
by constituting itself an economic pest of the first
water by its greedy and wasteful assaults on grain
and fruit. It must be admitted, however, as an
extenuating circumstance, that “poor Polly’s”
popularity as a cage-bird outweighs a good deal of
damage done, for a good many rupees must be turned
over annually by those who deal in Parrots.

THE PARROT. 121

‘Hundreds of the birds, both old and young, come
into the market annually, and seem to find a ready
sale, and certainly this Parrot is the commonest pet
bird here, and is very popular in Europe also. In
Calcutta, as everyone must have noticed, it is as
frequently chained as caged, often, alas, with a chain
which would hold an ordinary terrier! Poor Polly
indeed ! a heavy chain and an iron swing, or a small
hemispherical cage, form a sad exchange for the
‘tree tops and the blue sky. Somehow I always
pity a caged Parrot now, although Parrots do so well
in cages, and their slow crawling movements seem
so excellently suited for a captive’s narrow bounds.
But a wild Parrot shows one that half the bird’s
time is passed in its swift graceful flight—a flight,
‘by the way, that is strikingly different from that of
most land-birds, the downward-pointed wings, with
their sharp decisive stroke, at once recalling some
‘plover, sandpiper, or other shore-haunting fowl.
Like these aquatics, also, Polly carries her feet stowed
astern and not tucked up to the breast, though it
4ook mea long time to find this out when I was
investigating this point, with a view to discovering
4the reason for this difference in habit in birds—for
some kinds carry their feet forward and others behind
in the most inexplicable way. But one day a Parrot,
urged perhaps by a desire to examine its defunct

122 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

relatives, came into the Bird gallery of the museum,
and, as it careered to and fro overhead, it gave me an
opportunity of seeing how the feet were placed.
Ordinarily they seem to be buried in the under-tail-
coverts when the bird is on the wing, but this indivi-
dual was too flurried to put this final touch to its
flying attitude. As to the reason, I have not found
that out yet ; all birds belonging to a given natural
family seem to stow their feet in the same way, so
that it is probably only a meaningless inherited.
habit.

Parrots are chiefly winter birds with us in Calcutta,
but they must breed not far off, for some of the
infants brought into the Provision Bazaar are very
young indeed, and hardly fit to stand a long journey.
Nasty little things they are, some as naked as the-
palm of one’s hand, and of much the same colour.
Few, however, are quite nude, for, as a rule, the”
green feathers are beginning to sprout before they
are taken and brought in. The fledged young bird.
can be always known from the old one by its dark
eyes, a point to be borne in mind by those who are
buying Parrots as pets ; the old bird’s eyes are white—
that is to say, their iris is clearly showing off the
waxing and waning pupil which gives the bird such
a knowing, wicked look. There is probably some
meaning in this expression, for light eyes in birds.

THE PARROT. 123

are often indicative of a bad disposition in their
owners ; the yellow-eyed Black-crested Yellow Bulbul
(Otocompsa flaviventris) is much more spiteful than.
its common dark-eyed relations ; and any falconer
knows that the yellow-eyed short-winged hawks,
such as the goshawk and sparrow-hawk, have much
less manageable tempers than the true falcons, which
are all dark-eyed.

In spite of her “canister look in the heye,”
however, Polly makes a nice pet, and is often an
excellent talker. The only Indian Parrot I ever
actually heard talk was a specimen at a bird show
at home, which constantly marked in a thin piping,
but very clear voice “ Waiter bring Polly pint of
beer, quick, iquick, quick !” This was a hen bird,
and so I conclude that the sex is not of prime
importance in a talking Parrot. As most people know,
the male of our common Parrot can be easily distin-
guished by the pink ring round his neck,, which,
however, is not found in the newly-fledged bird, but
is a sign of maturity. Curiously enough, this pink
ring remains in the lutino or yellow variety, which
is not uncommon, and sells for a high price. It
certainly is a most lovely bird, being of a most even
and delicate yellow, and retaining the bright red
bill of the ordinary green bird. Among the wild.
green birds brought into Tiretta Bazaar—presumably

124 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

for sale to the guileless sailor—one often sees speci-
mens more or less heavily splashed with yellow, and
probably by pairing these the pure yellow form could
be bred at will in a few generations. In the only
observed case known to me of the actual production
of this variety, however, I am told that the parents
are just two ordinary green Parrots; they breed
every year in the same tree and all their brood are
always yellow, and a lively competition exists among
the local natives for the position of these valuable
youngsters.

It is a very curious fact that, popular as the Parrot
has always been as a pet, the native fanciers have
never attempted to breed this ’*“ sport” in confine-
ment ; whereas in the case of the little Australian
Grass Parrakeet or “ Budgerigar” (Melopsittacus
undulatus) which has only been known as a cagebird
in Europe for about half a century, a yellow variety
has already been fixed, and is now offered for sale
at a price doubtless highly gratifying to its producers.
The Budgerigar is a familiar cage-bird here and has
even escaped and’bred, but it has not yet, at all
events, established itself as one of our wild birds.

Our own native bird is certainly not very conspi-
cuous here at most times, and I was astonished to
find him so abundant in Bombay, where he is as
numerous as the mynah in Calcutta. The Parrot,

THE PARROT. 125:

however, will make his presence felt wherever he is,
and his familiar squeal over head is one of the
pleasantest sounds of a cold-weather morning. It is.
a curious fact that Parrots do not in their wild state
indulge their imitative faculties at all unlike the
clever starling tribe ; and so thousands of generations.
of them live and die in their native jungles without
ever fully exercising ears and tongue fully as acute,
in many cases, as our own. I say tongue conven:
tionally, of course, for in Parrots, as in other birds,
the tongue has nothing to do with the production
of the sounds uttered, human or otherwise; the
bird’s vocal organ being the syrinx, which is situated
at the base of the windpipe, where that organ forks
before entering the lungs.

I have not seen any other kind of Parrot wild about
here, but the large “Rock Parrot” (Paleornis:
nepalensis) is said to occur in that condition, and is at
all events such a very common captive as to require
notice. In the difference between different sexes.
and ages, and in its general colour and form it
resembles the ordinary Parrot, but it is not only
larger, but of a much duller green, and always.
possesses a splash of red on the wing. Its plumage
never seems to incline to yellow like the smaller,
Parrot’s, although we have in the museum a skin of
the very nearly allied Andaman large Parrot

126 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

{Paleornis magnirostris) which is nearly a pure
“Jutino.” This Andaman variety chiefly differs in
having a very much bigger bill, according to a very
general rule in island colonists among birds ; but why
an insular habitat should result ina big nose isa
problem which science has yet to solve.

XIX.—THE OWL.

“ The Owl and Ovwlet........ talking, scolding, at each
other.” —Longfellow.

THE ordinary notes of our common little spotted
Owlet (Athene brama) do certainly suggest family
jars, the spasmodic cackles in which it indulges before
beginning its nightly avocations sounding as if pro-
moted by very bad feeling. But, as a matter of fact,
the house Owlet is a harmless and not unsociable
little being ; I have seen one “ playing gooseberry ”’
to a pair of lovers of its own species with the utmost
nonchalance, and, up-country, where it comes out
in broad daylight, the other birds generally do not
seem to mind its presence, though I once saw one
being hustled by the “sat-bhai.” In Calcutta,
however, the Owls do not appear till the shades of
night have pretty well fallen, doubtless on account
of the crows, who, numbering among their very few
foes the large horned Owls, persecute all the tribe
on principle ; for, how are they to know that the
small Owls won’t grow up into big ones? We are
far too apt to fall into the mistake that birds are
born with an intimate knowledge of ornithology ;

128 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

that is a subject they have to study just as much as-
ourselves. No doubt the small birds suffer from.
the little Owl at times, but generally insects, mice,
and house-lizards must make up his bill of fare, as.
being most easily obtainable. He is not a bird of
powerful flight, and does not spend much time on
the wing, his up-and-down method of travelling
not being suited for hunting ; so he prefers to sit on
a telegraph-wire, or any other convenient perch,
and await eventualities.

He is very much of a domestic Ow] and, I am told,
is sometimes so tame in verandahs where he is.
unmolested, that he will let himself be touched ; for
under man’s hospitable roof he finds a dormitory
for the day-time, and a convenient nesting place.
The few eggs his mate lays are white, like those of
all Owls, and the fluffy owlets, when fledged, are drab-
and-white with yellow eyes just like their parents,.
for, as a general rule, Owls do not go in for invidious.
distinctions between different sexes and ages in the
matter of dress. In Burma and Western India, the
little Owls are smaller and darker than hereabout ;.
and in the north-west, about Peshawar, begins the
range of another species, the Bactrian Owlet (Athene
bacteriana) chiefly differing from the Indian bird in
being streaked instead of barred below. This bird’
is almost identical with the celebrated Ow] of Minerva.

THE OWL. 129

(Athene noctua), which must have been as common
in Athens as Athene brama is here, since “ to take
owls to Athens” was the classical equivalent for
taking coals to Newcastle. Minerva’s Owl was,
of course, the bird of wisdom, and by their selection
the Greeks showed their own discernment, for Owls
are anything but the futile creatures which popular
tradition makes them to be both here and at home.
An Owl combines valour with discretion ; his nest
is more dangerous to rob than a hawk’s, while as to
his habits by day he may well say with Diomed “ thou
dost miscall retire ; I do not fly, but advantageous
care withdrew me from the odds of multitude,” for
he can see well enough in the daytime, but is perfectly
conscious of his unpopularity with other birds,
Moreover, Owls are prudent and far-seeing, even to
laying up a store of food against time of dearth ;
not that our local owlet has any need to do this, as he
never goes into cold climates. In America, however,
the small horned-owl (Scops asio) has been found
gloating over a store of fresh fish, which he had taken
advantage of an artificial opening in the ice to procure
from a pond a mile off! That Owls should fish seems
unnatural, somehow, and yet wehave more than
one fishing species in India, and the ordinary
“ mousing owl ” of barn and steeple has been known
to turn piscator in England.
F, BC 9

130 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

\

The said Barn-owl (Strix flammea) is also found
in Calcutta, but is not nearly so conspicuous as the
little spotted bird, and is comparatively seldom seen,
owing, no doubt, to his more nocturnal habits. Now
and then one may see the big broad-winged bird
flapping steadily and silently over the compound,
or plunging into a bush to raid the roosting sparrows,
for this Owl is one of the enemies of those pestilential
finches, although his more ordinary diet consists of
“rats and mice and such small deer.” For the
capture of these he is eminently adapted ; his dark
eyes look out from a most perfectly-formed “ facial
disk,” that radiating arrangement of feathers so
beautifully contrived to concentrate the light—
though the immediate effect of the Barn-owl’s heart-
shaped countenance on most people is to make them
compare him to a monkey ; his wings are longer than
in other Owls, to sustain him in his search over open
ground for his victims, as he is not migratory ; and
his legs are also long, presumably for convenience
in a sudden grapple, since he is not a quick or elegant
pedestrian, his long talons being to grip with, not
to walk on. There is one point about the Barn-
owl’s structure, however, that badly needs explana.
tion, and that is the small-tooth-comb which he carries
on the inner side of his middle claw. It is true that,
all birds use this particular claw for scratching their

THE OWL. 131

heads with, and that some other species besides this
Owl have a similar arrangement ; but nature has
distributed the favour with a niggard and partial hand
and in a manner that at present defies conjecture.
But his structural peculiarities are not the only
points about the Barn-owl ; he teems with interest.
For one thing, he is one of the most cosmopolitan of
birds, being found practically everywhere, except
in the high north and in New Zealand ; he varies in
colour and size to an extent which has given natu-
ralists a great deal of trouble, for several beautiful
species could be made out of him if his progeny
would stick to one type. But this they will not do;
once in Calcutta I had two fine young birds of the
same age, and presumably the same brood, of which
one had a white face and breast, while the other’s
breast was buff, and its face smoky grey. Both
were spotted with black below, which is usual
with the Barn-owl here, whereas in England the
bird’s waistcoat is plain. The English Barn-owl
also tends to sport a white tail, the Indian bird’s
being buff with dark bars. But then the same
bird in Jamaica comes out with the points of
the English form, thus upsetting a beautiful rule
that might otherwise be framed to the effect that
“insular tropical forms of this owl are very dark.”
The Andaman Barn-owl certainly bears out the rule

°

”

132 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

to the letter, but as it is also conspicuous by having
very much shorter wings than the continental birds,
while the bill and feet are just as big if not bigger,
it may really be a distinct species altogether. This
raises the interesting question as to whether the dark
insular-tropical Owls of this kind are a primitive
race like the small dark human races which have a
way of cropping up in out-of-the-way places, or
whether the Barn-owl, when it gets on.a tropical
island, proceeds with singular uniformity to dege-
nerate in complexion and power of wing. One might
argue a point like this till doomsday, and so as the
Barn-owl is an eminently useful bird, it is fortunate
that he has been introduced into New Zealand,
which is sufficiently insular, if not tropical ; there
he can evolve for such of our great-grandsons as
take an interest in natural history.

Unfortunately, and thisanother point of interest.
about the Barn-owl, he is not popular. Owls, gener-
ally speaking, are considered uncanny as well as
stupid ; and the Barn-owl, both in Europe and in
India, is the worst reputed of the lot. From Spenser,
who called him “the rueful shrick, still waiting on
the bere,” to the modern Spaniard, who thinks he
is of the devil’s poultry and drinks the oil out of
church lamps, his reputation has been hopelessly
bad in the west. And out here the native calls him

THE OWL. 133

the “bad bird” or “ death-bird,” and dreads his
weird screech accordingly ; but he does not kill him
wantonly or for the purpose of mounting him as a
hand-sereen. The use of the Owl to the native
consists in his various magical properties, chief of
which is the fact that if you serve him up instead
of chicken in a curry the hapless partaker thereof
will become as stupid as an owl, a consummation
devoutly to be wished in the case of an enemy !

XX.—THE VULTURE.

Never stoops the soaring vulture

But another vulture, watching

From his high eriall lookout,

Sees the downward plunge, and follows

And a third pursues the second,

Coming from the invisible ether,

First a speck, and then a vulture,

Pica the air is dark with pinions.—Longfellow.
THE length of the above quotation will, I am sure,
be excused for the sake of its beauty and accuracy ;
for it is now well established that Vultures find their
food not by scent, as some authors use to maintain,
but by sight only. Nor is it necessarily the case that
a Vulture should discover it at all; often the
ubiquitous crow is the first comer, only to be driven off
by the kite, who in turn yields place to his betters.
The commonest Vulture hereabout is certainly the
Bengal or white-backed species (Pseudogyps
bengalensis), which may be seen almost any day
soaring high in air, his wings flat and motionless as
boards, in hope of the full mea] that he gets, perhaps
once a week, For when a carcase is found, and the

THE VULTURE. 125

Vultures are assembled to enjoy it, they quarrel a
good deal over the repast, and many have to stand
back before their despot, the King Vulture (Otogyps
calvus), who keeps the plebians off till he is satisfied ;
though even he fears the great Adjutant Stork (Lep-
toptilus dubius), once so common in Calcutta, but
now, alas! only a memory. The Bengal Vulture
is a dull dirty-looking bird of a dingy black, relieved
only by some white on the back and under the wing,
and this only noticeable in flight. The regal bird,
which is not nearly so numerous, is of a richer black-
ness, and has a bright red head, with a pendent flap
on each side, as the insignia of his rank. The young
of both are of a dirty brown, and in this resemble
our third local species, the Long-billed Vulture
(Gyps tenuirastris), which is, however, easily distin-
guishable by its very long and lean head and neck ;
it is quite a grey-hound among Vultures. The best
place to study Vultures and their want of manners is at
Dhappa, to which richly-flavoured locality I once
made an expedition for that purpose. Here the
Bengal Vultures fare somewhat meagrely on the
boiled garbage thrown out from the vats after the
town carcases of horse and bullock have been boiled
down for grease ; and as they are nearly as tame as
turkeys they can be easily watched. The Long-billed
birds are few and more shy ; they keep aloof, disdaining

5136 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

I was told, boiled beef in the hope of a more
dainty meal of dead dogs and rats. To these
viands the King Vulture appears also more addicted,
but I saw none at Dhappa and was told they were
rare there and much more wary than the rest. In
fact, the first occasion on which I identified his
vulturine highness in Calcutta was when two of the
species pitched on the maidan, apparently to settle
some difference of opinion. Since then I have seen
one or two others there. ’

In Vultures we have in the East not only the rajah
and the common ruck of his subjects of various
species, but the humble sweeper, in the form of the
well-known White Scavenger Vulture (Neophron
ginginianus). This bird, however, eschewed the
neighbourhood of Calcutta for, although appallingly
accommodating of stomach, he has some delicacy
of constitution about him, and avoids a moist
climate.

It is a curious thing that the same hierarchy of
Vultures obtains in America, although the birds
there belong to a distinct family of their own; the
old-world vultures being very near of kin to the
eagles. In South America we get a handsome and
powerful King Vulture (Cathartes papa), but creamy-
fawn is here the royal colour ; and he has for subjects
the mean Turkey-Buzzards (Oenops aura), in their

THE VULTURE. 137

rusty black, and the Gallinazos or Black Vultures
(Catharistes atratus), which look uncommonly like
our scavenger, only dipped in ink, the colours of
sovereign and sweeper being practically reversed.
It is a curious fact that the Old and New World
Vultures, like the monkeys of the two worlds, can
most readily be separated by the form of the nostrils ;
the difference in the case of the birds being that in
the Eastern Vultures there is a partition between
the nostrils as in most animals, whereas in the Western
family this is absent, and you can look right through
the beak from one side to the other. The American
Vultures also have weaker feet and do not build
nests ; and they have no voice-muscles, so that they
can only hiss. Their Eastern relatives, though not
taloned like eagles, are more powerful in the extre-
mities, and even carry nesting material therewith
for they build large unwieldy nests on trees or rocks ;
and they are suffieiently well endowed with a vocal
apparatus to vent their affections in horrid bellowings
at the breeding season. Our Vultures here build
large rough nests in trees, of fresh boughs torn off by
main strength, and the plebeians are sociable, nesting
in colonies; royalty, of course, can tolerate no
neighbouring rivals. As a rule, they only lay one
egg ; a large fertility is not necessary to keep up the
numbers of birds whith run so few risks as Vultures

138 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

do and possess such iron constitutions. They
have even been known to take and survive doses of
poison which would inevitably have proved fatal to
anything else.

A pleasing subject, for gpeculation is the baldness
of these disreputable fowl. Of course the most
obvious explanation is that feathers on a head which
is continually being poked inside carcases would soon
be the reverse of ornamental, if not unhealthy; but
as Darwin, with his usual philosophic caution,
remarks, the head of the cleanly turkey is just as
naked. So are those of the Ibis and the Cassowary,
and the Sarus Crane, and scattered here and there
throughout the bird class we come upon heads grie-
vously in need of a hair restorer. It will, however,
be noticed, that such usually belong to big birds ;
and that where degrees of baldness exist in any given
family, the biggest will also generally be the barest
on the top. The Ostrich indeed, the largest of all
birds, is also the nakedest ; his head and neck only
have scanty hairs, and his thighs are completely nude.
To apply this to the Vulture; the low-caste and
under-sized Scavenger has a bald face, the ordinary
Vultures a sparsely downy head and neck, the Long-
billed, a longer and nakeder neck, and the King
luxuriates in complete bald-headedness accentuated.
by side-flaps, and a naked red patch inside each thigh.

THE VULTURE. 139

A very similar gradation may also be traced with the
American kinds. So, too, with the cranes. The
little Demoiselle (Anthropoides virgo) has her pretty
head well covered ; the Coolung (Grus communis) is
much bigger and is bare on the top ; the white Crane
(Grus leucogeranus), bigger still, is bare from beak
to eyes all round ; and the great Sarus is naked all.
over his head and some way down his neck. Thus
we arrive at the fact that baldness and prosperity in
birds somehow go together ; when a species gets up
in the world it can afford to take off some otf its
feathers where they wil! not be missed, and go about.
more or less decollete. A simpler explanation would
be that when a bird "gets over a certain size it can’t
grow enough feathers to cover itself properly ; but
after all this involves the other, for it must be pros-
perous to be big at all. Vultures may certainly
claim to be well-to-do, though they don’t look it.
Their simple tastes are more easily gratified than
the expensive ones of the eagles, who, however, will
condescend to bully the best of them occasionally
in order to take of their high yet humble repast ;
and nobody owes them a grudge, for they do no ane
any harm to speak of. Yet there are curious limits.
to their spread which are hard to understand. It is
strange that there should be none in Ceylon,
for instance, and that none inhabit Australia ; for

a.

140 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

though not migratory, they are great travellers on
occasion—the Arabs of North Africa said that during
the Crimean War the Vultures emigrated to Europe
‘with an eye to unlimited dead horse. They can bear
‘both heat and cold, and the only hindrance they
‘would be likely to meet, one would think, would be
‘heavy jungle in which they could not see their food.
The New World birds are more enterprising, for the
‘Turkey Buzzard extends from end to end, almost, of
the American Continent and is a well-known bird
everywhere. It is true that one of the Old World
birds, the huge Cinerecus Vulture (Vuléur monachus)
also spreads from Spain to China, but it is not a
common species anywhere, so that there must be
some check on its increase that does not exist in
the case of the much weaker and smaller Turkey
Buzzard, which is a very insignificant bird compared
to it. But nothing demonstrates better than the

study of the lives of birds that the battle is not

always to the strong. The Turkey Buzzard in
Jamaica has itself been recently experiencing a
serious and quite unexpected check by reason of the
introduction of one of our best known Indian animals,
the mongoose. This beast plays havoc with the
eggs of the poor Vulture, which has not, so far,
-Aeveloped sufficient sense to move his domestic
‘belongings to a safer situation than the bare ground

THE VULTURE. 141

and has become much less numerous in consequence.
It is evident therefore that ‘‘ John Crow,” as the-
Turkey Buzzard is called, has not intelligence equal:
to his constitution, and that he has prospered so far
more by luck than judgment.

XXI.—THE KITE.

“© When the kite builds look to lesser linen.””—Shakes-
peare.

THE Kite is a melancholy example of unutilized
‘talents. He could, if he chose to exert himself, be
monarch of all he surveyed in Calcutta, but he lets
the crow get there before him every time. You
never see a crow miss the opportunity of annoying
a Kite, but what does the Kite do in retaliation ?
He essays a few robberies with violence, it is true ;
but only once, and that after several years’ residence
here, have I seen him successful. Usually the
pursued crow “ puts in,” as a falconer would say,
toa house or tree in time to save his bacon or whatever
else he has appropriated. Indeed, I have seen him
settle down to peek at his booty, held firmly under
his foot, before the baffled Kite had wheeled away.
That the Kite can be formidable if he likes, anyone
may find out who cares to stroll out on a verandah
with an unconcermed expression and anything edible—
or that a Kite’s experience of human habits leads
him to think may be so. The experimenter will find
‘that an unseen bird will sweep down from behind

“ce

THE KITH. 143

and whip the object of experiment out of his hand
before he can say whatever he is in the habit of
saying on occasions of unpleasant surprise. “ There’s
many a slip ’twixt the cup and the lip ” was once
admirably exemplified to me by a Kite. I was im-
prudently drinking tea in the open when I felt a flap
on my nose, and the cup was rudely dashed to the
ground—but I never saw the Kite ; nor is this the only
occasion on which a Kite burglariously attacked me—
in fact, I kept always ready for them latterly. Their
dexterity is something marvellous; never have I
been scratched by their talons, though I have had
bread snatched out of my very hand. It is this
wonderful management of wing and foot that makes
the Kite in spite of his shabby brown plumage and
general appearance as of a small eagle run to seed,
such a beautiful and interesting bird to watch at his
task of scavenging. Whatever his mark is, he
always takes it with his feet and holding it therein,
he will, if the object be small enough and his com-
panions do not interfere, dine on it in mid-air. So-
rooted is this habit that when he is making a light
supper on the delicious and succulent white-ant as
it swarms, he ceremoniously seizes even this minute
prey in one foot instead of snapping it up with his
pill. The only time he breaks his rule of “ feet
before bill” is when he is carrying sticks for his nest,

144 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

at which time he may often be seen with his load in
his beak. This seems a peculiarly senseless habit,
but it is quite possible that the Kite’s idea is to have
his feet free for fighting, for he relies on his talons
rather than his bill in this also. Everyone has seen
how, of two bickering Kites, the lower bird will turn
on his back to receive the swoop of the upper, till
with locked talons they go slowly spinning towards
the ground ; generally having sense enough to let go
before they reach it, however. On the ground the
Kite is not at home ; he walks in a stiff-legged fashion,
and gets under way with some difficulty, like most
long-winged birds ; and as he wants a lot of room for
his evolutions, he has little use for trees, except to
perch on the top of them. He seems, indeed, when
nesting, to favour buildings much more than the crow,
no doubt for this reason.

I have not observed in the Kite’s matrimonial
arrangement that refined delicacy which has been
alluded to in the case of the crow. Endearments and
presents seem to be at a discount, and the banns of
marriage are published abroad by an aggravation
of the ordinary virulent squealing which is to my
mind the Kite’s worst fault as a town bird.
Ornamental, except in flight, he certainly is not,
though he seems to have an idea that he is suited
for mural decoration, judging from the way in which

THE KITE. 145

he spread-eagles himself against any warm wall. The
young Kite is indeed handsomely spotted with buff
after he has grown out of his white nestling-down—
for young Kites are not indecently nude like young
crows—but when this ultimately gives place to the
sombre sruff-colour of the adult bird, there is little
for the xsthetic eye to take hold of. But the Kite
may fairly claim to be both useful and harmless.
Garbage of any sort, from a dead rat to a footful of
boiled rice, he will appropriate and make away with,
if not robbed of it by the crows ; and he cannot very
well do much harm, as anything with any sense
knows how to get out of his way. Moreover, he is
an arrant coward as a rule, though bolder in defence
of his nest than the crow, whose parental affection
is apt to be overborne by a prudent distrust of his
powers of flight ; a Kite’s nest is not to be approached
without caution if one does not want to be clawed
over the scalp.

The Kite’s most sapien habit is that of eating
his prey alive—a trait which marks him as a bird
accustomed to tackle what can’t hit him back ; since
the “nobler” hawks have, in self-defence, to kill
their more powerful quarry, as quickly as possible.
Altogether he is not a nice bird, and one can quite
understand how when tame falcons and wild Kites
were well known to our ancestors, the name of the

F, BC 10

146 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

latter bird became a common term of abuse. For
the Kite was once as common in England as in India :
a Bohemian visitor noticed in the fifteenth century
that he had never seen so many Kites anywhere as
round London Bridge—an observation that throws
a lurid light on the City sanitation. The common
European Kite, however, is not exactly the same
bird as his relative here. Milvus govinda, our urban
sanitator, is smaller than Milvus ictinus of Europe,
which is much redder in colour, especially on the tail,
and whiter on the head—in fact a finer bird
altogether.

This bird, despised as he was generally, was royal
game in falconry ; for, coward as the Kite is, to
capture him taxes the powers of a falcon to the
utmost, and one that could perform the feat: was
deemed fit for “a prince’s pleasant sport.” The
Kite when pursued by the falcon “ takes the sky,”
and both birds rise to a great height, the quarry
endeavouring, as long as he may, to shift from the
fatal grip of his more powerful enemy. Indeed, in
one case in which King James I was induced
personally to witness the flight at a Kite of a couple
of falcons which had been procured for him, both
pursuers and pursued went out of sight altogether
and permanently, an extreme form of the diversion

which could hardly have been pleasing to the
}

THE. KITE. 147

parsimonious prince, for the birds had cost a
thousand pounds to procure, being so remarkably
good that they had taken nine Kites running without
a miss.

With the advance of sanitation and the decay of
falconry the English Kite began to be looked on
solely as a nuisance. Cuffs and collars were not safe
when hejwas furnishing his nest, as Shakespeare
knew, and many young chickens fell victims to his
insidious attacks. At the same time, there has been
no reason to shoot and trap him so mercilessly as has
been done, making the Kite one of the rarest of
British birds. But as the Indian Kite has the whole
of India to range over, and goes even as far as
Australia, no amount of sanitation, poultry-breeding,
or game-preserving, is likely to bring him anywhere
near extermination. Talking of the Kite’s residence,
it is curious that Jerdon alludes to a story that they
leave Calcutta almost entirely.during the rains, which,
Dr. Blanford says, is perfectly correct. How such
an idea could have arisen I do not know. I have
always, noticed Kites in the rains, and have never
heard that they ever were in the habit of leaving
Calcutta then. This Kite is not usually migratory,
unlike the big Kite of the hills (Milwus melanotis)
which may be distinguished by its white instead of
yellow feet, white patch under the wing, and larger

148 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

size, the male hill-Kite being as big as or bigger than
the female of our low-country bird. Females in Kites,
it should be observed, are larger than males, follow-
ing the usual but inexplicable rule of birds of prey.

Milous melanotis, as one sees him at Darjeeling,
is certainly a finer bird altogether than our Calcutta
cockney, but both are thrown into the shade by
another common Calcutta resident, the Brahminy
Kite (Haliastur indus). It is rather an insult to
class this bird with the Kites, for he is, at all events,
of a much better jat, as his name implies, though
Tommy, having converted the same name into
“‘ Bromley-Kite,” applies it to the common pariah
bird. In his first plumage, indeed, the Brahminy
Kite is very like the adult pariah, but may be easily
distinguished by his rounded tail—the other’s being
forked in the old and square in the young—and by
“a certain indefinable style.” When he becomes.
adult, however, there is no possible confusion, the
Brahminy’s brilliant chestnut, set off by black quills
and a white head, being quite unique among Indian
birds of prey. To see the Brahminy one has usually
to go down the Hooghly, for he is not mu@h of a
town bird, though I used to see one not unfrequently
at the Museum tank. He is said to be a bolder
bird than the common Kite, and to rob this bird of
its prey. Other birds fear him little as a rule,

THE KITE. 149

however ; I have seen one perched on a bush with
several paddy-birds, and a king-fisher has been
known to “wipe the eye” of a Brahminy in the
matter of a fish the latter was stooping to seize. In
this case, however, the small bird paid dearly for his
impudence, for the indignant bird of prey vindictively
hunted him down and devoured him alive!

The Brahminy reminds one rather of the American
Bird o’Freedom, and indeed he is rather a dwarf sea-
eagle than a Kite. Curiously enough there are no
Kites, properly so called, in America, for the bird so
styled by American ornithologists do not seem parti-
cularly like what we associate with the name in the Old
World. One can understand that the carrion-hawks
would stand in their way in South America,
but it is difficult to understand why they have not
spread into the fine field for emigration offered by the
top half of the great Western continent.

Spotted Dove.
Turtur suratensis.

XXII.—_THE DOVE.

“ The love of the turtle.” —Byron.

Mr. Put Rosinsoy, in his delightfully humorous
book “ Noah’s Ark,” arrives at the conclusion that.
the lion takes rank as king of the beasts because he
roars loudest : and similarly the Dove seems to have
gained credit as the truest and most typical lover
among the birds, because he makes the most fuss
about his affections. At any rate the fancy of our
spotted Turtle-dove (Turtur suratensis) seems to
tura to thoughts of love the whole year round. Any
day you may see him bowing profoundly to the

’

THE DOVE. 151

object of his adoration and inflating his speckled neck
as he gives forth his rather harsh and unmelodious
coo. For, as a cooer, he does not compare
it all favourably with another Dove very familiar
in Calcutta, the domestic fawn-coloured or white
Dove, which ir so well-known as a cage-bird, although
its real origin and home seem to be still doubtful.
The spotted Dove, however, has few rivals among
the Turtle-doves in the matter of plumage, being
most elegantly spotted with pinkish fawn on a drab
ground, 2nd boasting a black tippet spotted with
white as a neck ornament. As is usual with Doves,
the male and female are equally pretty, but the
young birds have no tippet-marking at first, and only
a dingy indication of the pretty speckling on the back,
which will appear later. The eggs whence the twin
offspring are disclosed are white, as in all Doves, and
deposited on a flimsy collection of twigs, placed,
doubtless, in some secure retreat: for, in spite of
the numbers of doves to be seen about suitable
compounds, their nests are not by any means common
objects, and, considering the proverbial helplessness of
“*¢wo strengthless doves,” it is really very creditable
to the pretty pairs that they bring 6ff so many
young. Love, indeed, supplies much to these weak
creatures, giving them courage not only to fight each
other with their feeble bills and unarmed wings, but

152 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

even to attack the blackguard crow, even it not, as
Shakespeare says, to “ peck the estridge.”’ They are
the best of parents, too : if the wild cock dove is like
his tame relative, he is a most admirable husband
and father, taking his fair share of the sitting, 4.€.,
most of the day time, and feeding his young just as
assiduously as their mother does; first with the
“ pigeon’s milk ” secreted in the crop, and afterwards
with softened grain and other vegetable food.
The vegetarian habits of the Doves, and their
want of special weapons for fighting and of means of
defence, have no doubt given them their reputation
for gentleness, which is really hardly deserved, in
respect of their relations to each other. Harmless to
other birds not of their own species or family they
undoubtedly are ; but among themselves, and with |
other members of the tribe, the Doves generally
display a spirit of nagging which leads one to suspect
that the author, who spoke of the “ mild, humble,
patient, peaceful dove” had never made the
acquaintance of the bird outside a pigeon-pie. The
terms “ pigeon ” and “ dove ” seem to have originally
been, to a certain extent, interchangeable ; but now
the latter term has been confinedin use almost
exclusively to the smaller members of the family,
such as our present subject. Mild, then, the Dove
certainly is not, but a most inveterate pugilist in a

THE DOVE. 153

feeble way ; and he can hardly be called patient, in
-consideration of the way in which a new-caught bird
will knock itself about in captivity ; although the
species can be so far reconciled to that condition as
to propagate itself therein, as happened some years
ago in the London Zoological Gardens. As to
humility, that can hardly be assigned as a
-conspicuous quality of birds so given to bloating and
bowing and scraping as are the Doves. They are all,
‘taken as a family, given to this form of ostentation ;
but the turtle group have also a very pretty form of
showing off which is very characteristic of them.
‘This consists in the bird towering up in the air for a
short distance, and then sailing downward with
-outspread tail, so as to show off the light and
‘dark marking of the under-surface thereof to the
fair spectator below.

I have seen this done by several wild species, and
also by a tame bird, to which I used occasionally
to allow a little liberty ; and this shows the persistence
-of the instinct, for the quarters in which such tame
Doves are usually kept are not so spacious as to
afford facilities for the performance. But nothing
is more striking than the fidelity with which
individuals of a species, or various naturally allied
‘species will reproduce the same attitudes in courtship,
‘showing the essentially artless and instinctive nature

154 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

of the performance. Thus, all the Turtle-doves,
when bowing, keep their tail closed, not spreading
it as the pigeon does, though they have just as much,
if not more, reason for doing so, as the closure
' prevents the light side feathers from being seen.

The Turtle-doves, however, may well be tenacious
of their customs, for they are a prosperous clan,
albeit confined to the Old World, and mostly to the
warmer parts thereof ; but their conjugal and parental
devotion enables them to increase rapidly in spite
of individual feebleness and small broods, and.
wherever they occur they are common birds as a rule.
Only a few migrate, but our only English species,.
the traditional and original Turtle-dove (Turtur
communis), is a thriving migrant which is continually
extending its range northward. The Spotted Dove
is a short-winged bird compared with this and is one-
of our resident and most characteristic birds in India ;
in Burma its place is taken by a very near ally, the
Malay Spotted Dove (Turtur tagrinus), which is less.
distinctly spotted, while further east, in China, we
get another species (Turtur chinensis) which is not-
spotted at all, although it bears.a black-and-white
tippet like the other two.

Another Dove that may sometimes, but not often,.
be met with in Calcutta is the Ring-dove (Turtur
risortus), a bird very like the tame Dove, but drab-

THE DOVE. 155:

instead of fawn in colour. Indeed, as the tame -
bird appears to be sometimes coloured just like the
wild one, one might put it down as the descendant.
of the latter, were it not that the coo of the two birds.
is different. It may be urged in this connection
that there is a difference in the song of the white
tame and the grey wild Java sparrows ; but in these
ring-necked Turtle-doves the notes of the various.
wild species are so distinct that the coo becomes a
character of importance. The wild Ring-dove never
seems to utter the peculiar sniggering laugh of the
tame one, which is quite unlike any note made by
any other Turtle-dove I know, and I have studied.
several in life. Whether or not it gave origin to the
world-familiar domestic pet, the Ring-dove of India
has a wide range on its own account, and may soothe
with its cooing the ears of many men of many races.
from the unspeakable Turk in Europe to the heathen.
Chinese in the uttermost Last.

XXIIL—THE GULL.

“* Sauntering hither on listless wings.” —Bret Harte.

For some reason or other, the warmer seas are
mot rich in species of Gulls, and so these graceful
birds are not so numerous with us as one used to
European sea-ports would expect to find them.
Indeed, all round the wide extent of the coasts of
the Indian Empire not nearly so many Gulls are
found as have¥been recorded from the British Islands,
and in our part of India only oae species can be c: lled
really common. This is the Brown-headed Gull
(Larus brunneicephalus), a familiar enough object
‘to any one who keeps bis eyes open when in sight
of the Hooghly during a large part of the year. After
the hot weather has well set in, however, it leaves
us for the high regions of Central Asia, where it
breeds, though ‘no one has as yet been lucky enough
to take the eggs, which are therefcre as yet
undescribed. It is not likely, however, that they
will be very different from the usual brown and
spotted type found in the family.

It is only just before it leaves us that the Gull
dons its brown hood, and its general plumage, of white

*

THE GULL. 157

below and French-grey above, is so much of a family
livery that it would not be very distinctive if there
were several species to be confounded together here..
But this is not the case, for the only other Gull one
is at all likely to see in Calcutta is a familiar home
bird, the Laughing Gull (Larus rididundus), so abun-
dant and tame in Scotland, and reputed to be the
producer of many of the “Plover’s eggs” of
commerce. This bird is, however, slightly smaller
than the commoner Indian one, has dark instead of
light eyes, and—a much more noticeable distinction—
the longest flight-feathers, forming the tip of the
wing, mostly white, while in the bigger bird these are
chiefly black. By this the young birds also may be.
distirguished ; in both species they are much like
each other, having the upper plumage more brown
than grey, and a broad black band at the end of the
tail. Moreover, their legs and bills are only coloured
orange, instead of the rich deep red which adorns.
these parts in the old birds. As in all Gulls, there
is no difference in plumage between male and female.
But, like the pigeons, in which a similar equality
usually exists, Gulls are very demenstrative in their
courtships, as may be seen in the captive birds at
Alipore Zoo. The attitude which the enamoured.
Gull apparently considers most attractive is an
arched neck and wings opened in front, while kept.

158 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

close at the tips, and no doubt it does as well as any
other, for the whole family carry all their delicate
beauty of colour fully exposed, not havirg, like so
many birds, hidden charms to display. For they
are better off than the dwellers on land as regards
enemies ; their easy, lazy looking flight is yet well
calculated to puzzle a hawk, and their habit of
flocking at their breeaing places makes for protection
when their helpless offspring need it. Helpless
comparatively, that is to say, for the young Gull,
although it does not run about and find its own food
‘like a young duck, is yet open-eyed and downy,
and able to get about and look after itself to some
extent ; thus being an interestirg link between the
active chick and the blind naked helpless nestlings
of so many birds. The brown-mottled plumage,
which is the first feathering of the young Gull, is
also probably a protection, while it gains strength,
of wing and experience, for, as one may see
at home, where so many Gulls are bred, it makes
the young bird much harder to see when on the
shore than is the old one in its grey and white
dress.

Another advantage Gulls have in the struggle for
existence is their readiness of resource; their ease
and grace of flight is patent to every observer, and
though they are not very swift on the wing, they can

THE GULL. 159

easily follow and circle round a steamer. On the land
they run about actively, without the usual waddle of
a water-fowl, but with a pretty mincing gait peculiarly
their own; and on the water they sit lightly and
gracefully, though they do not swim very fast and
cannot usually dive at all. In case of need, they
perch readily enough, though their feet are not
suited for taking a grip of anything, and they have
to rely upon balance.

Above all, they are very easily accommodated with
food ; fish they like when they can get it, but they
are not very clever fishers, and their best opportunity
is when the hapless fry are hard beset by the
bigger members of the class below, and are not in a
condition to look after themselves; and so they
fall back on insect and vegetable food and garbage
of various sorts, including especially what is thrown
overboard from ships and fishing-boats. It may
be that their scarcity in warm seas is due to the
comparative rarity of ships and fishing stations
therein ; but, it is also very possible that heat does
not suit most Gulls’ constitutions. At any rate,
two non-Indian species, the common Gull (Larus
canus) and the Great Black-backed Gull (Larus
marinus), did not thrive in captivity at the Alipore
Zoo, where the Brown-headed Gull and its smaller
relative have done very well.

160 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

Whether from their greater ability to provide for
themselves piscatorially, or from a heat-enduring
nature, the Gulls’ graceful relatives, the Terns, are
quite at home in the Tropics. They certainly prefer
warm regions, as they leave Northern Europe in
winter, and many breed even in our seas around.
India. They may be known from Gulls by their
usually smaller size, forked tails—whence their
alternative name of sea-swallows—and small feet,
and their bills. are not hooked like those of Gulls.
They are constantly on the wing, plunging down
with a headlong dash on their prey of small fish and
shrimps, or even hunting over the dry land for
insects. Most of them are so much alike in colour,
being of a delicate grey set off by a black cap, that.
they are hard to distinguish at a distance ; but one
species or another may often be seen about Calcutta.
I have even noticed them hawking over the museum
tank, right in the town. Occasionally in winter
they find their way into the Provision Bazaar, where
not being ducks or “ E-shnipe,”’ they go down as
“ Peeluver bird” along with other miscellaneous
wild fowl. Some of these really are worth eating,
but it is hard when the pretty Terns are translated
from their proper sphere of landscape ornamentation
to ingloriously disfigure a sorry scrap of toast.

XXIV.—THE PADDY-BIRD.

“ The eel’s foe the herown.”—Chaucer.

Iv is not many cities of this size that can claim a
heron of any sort as a resident, but the Pond Heron
or Paddy-bird (Ardeola grayi) lives and moves and
has his being with us always, and is very fairly
numerous. Conspicuous he is too, when he spreads
his white wings for flight ; until then you will probably
not notice him at all in most cases. For his drab
upper plumage is most admirably protective, and
he would well merit the title of the “ surprise bird,”’
if the American globe-trotter had not already
bestowed that on the Roller or blue-jay. When the
breeding season comes on in the rains, however,
the Paddy-bird feels that he must be smart at all
risks, and goes in for a dun ruff and maroon cloak,
an alteration in his appearance that “gives him
away” at once. I say “him,” but as a matter of
fact “her ” would be just as correct, for the Paddy-
birds, like most of the heron family, show no
difierence between the sexes, even when they put on
a wedding-dress, Young Paddy-birds are drab-and-
white like the old ones in winter, though they may

F, BC 11

162 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

be distinguished by the white of the wings being
slightly sullied in places. When they are squabs
in the nest, their scanty down allows their skin to
be seen, and this, curiously enough, is of a light and
cheerful green like their legs, and contrasts strikingly
with their flesh-coloured beaks. They always have
green legs, but the beak, as they grow up, changes
to blue and yellow with a black tip. Their eyes too
are always yellow like those of most herons, this
giving the family a vicious appearance, which their
disposition does not belie; for, though sociable at
breeding and roosting-time, they are decidedly
quarrelsome, ill-conditioned birds in their general
character. What every heron wants is to be let
alone, and if he feels his liberties and rights are being
encroached upon, he does his best to give the intruder
“one in the eye” with a despatch and accuracy
which are the natural outcome of much fishing
experience. The heron tribe are, indeed, specialists in
the art of taking aim and biding their time ; they
do not generally walk about after their prey but wait
for it to come to them, and reach for it when it is
obliging enough to do so. Their general habits and
attitudes are very stereotyped, and any one who
has watched the little Paddy-bird will have a very
good idea of most of his relatives. They all keep
their necks curved back on their shoulders when they

THE PADDY-BIRD, 163

are flying, unlike most other long-necked birds
and they mostly fly with the same easy regular stroke
of the wings, which, in the case of the bigger species
is much quicker than it looks. Twice I have timed
the wing-strokes of the big grey heron (Ardea cinerea)
at home, and both times found them to be two to
every second.

They build, too, the same style of nest, a miserable
platform of sticks or other convenient material,
generally in a tree, like the Paddy-bird, and the eggs
are usually light blue like hers. It is their difference
from other birds that’ makes herons so striking and
interesting ; their usually silent undemonstrative
ways, stiff, persistent attitudes, and the strange
contrast of their bustle and clamour where they
congregate, make them attract every one’s attention
wherever they are found. Also, though far less
graceful in form than many other water-birds, they
have the fatal gift of beauty in the form of filmy
feathers they bear on their backs as wedding
garments ; which, in the trade, have somehow got the
absurd name of “ ospreys.” For these the poor birds
are ruthlessly shot down, though this has not been
done so much in India as in America, where the
valuable white-plumed species have been terribly
persecuted—and most cruelly, as they carry these
plumes all the while they are rearing young. It is

164 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

fortunate for the Paddy-bird that he does not bear
plumage of the first quality, but still he gets indented
on to a certain extent. But under the Act that has
now been made about bird protection, he will receive
all the immunity he needs, for herons are easy birds
to legislate about, owing to their distinctness,
which makes them always distinguishable, and their
unanimity in the matter of places and season for
breeding. It is just possible, indeed, that protection
may be overdone in case of these fish-eating birds,
though not very likely, as they are themselves
esteemed as food by some natives. It seems,
however, that the Bufi-backed Egret (Bubulcus
coromandus), which forms so picturesque an object in
the landscape as he stalks by the dark buffaloes, is
tabooed by certain fastidious Mussulmans, because he
picks ticks off pigs! This pretty bird has considerably
advanced in shaking off heron traditions—
or sunk, as the rest of the family may possibly say.
Not only does he live on ticks and grasshoppers
instead of fish, but he walks about a lot, and is sociable
all the time, though this is probably only accidental,
and due to the fact that several find one beast
convenient both as a preserve and a beater for game.
Similarly one may see on the maidan tanks several
Paddy-birds standing about casually on the weeds
and mud, but nothing is more obvious than that

«

THE PADDY-BIRD. 165

they have not been introduced, and are not on
speaking terms. The Buff-backed Egret is not a
Caleutta bird, but some other of the Paddy-bird’s
relations are. I have seen the little Cinnamon
Bittern (Ardetta cinnamomea) wild in the Zoo, and it
has bred in the Botanic Gardens; and the Blue
Bittern (Dupetor flavicotlis), which is dark slate with
a buff neck, bred wild in the Zoo, a year or two ago,
and probably does still. Then, of course, all habitués
of that exhibition know that the Night-Heron
(Nycticorax griseus) has for years invaded the
Alipore Gardens and used the islands in the middle
of the tank for a combination of dormitory and
nursery, in large numbers too.

So numerous, indeed, did they become, that they
had to be given notice to quit, so that the heronry
is now a thing of the past. The Night-Heron is
much bigger than the Paddy-bird, being larger than
a crow, and is unusually short-necked and thickset
for a heron. The old one is slate-grey and black,
while the young are brown with white spots, and
look altogether different. Whether the habit of
going out at night is of great benefit to this bird is
hard to say, but he certainly has a very wide range
being found over most of the world. The Paddy-bird
is purely Indian and Burmese, and is so very common
that he is one of the characteristic birds of the

166 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA.

country. In Burma and the Andamans, however,
he meets a slightly larger relative, who wears the
same winter dress, but in summer plumage has a
maroon ruff and slate back. This bird has been
unkindly named Ardeola bacchus ; but I am not aware
that its behaviour justifies the appellation, although
another member of the heron family, the Malay
Bittern (Gorsachius melanolophus), was once captured
in Ceylon in a disgraceful state of intoxication owing
to indulgence in toddy.