314 BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



flew full in his face and beat off the astonished soldier. It used to be my great 

 amusement, on going through the grounds, to whistle for the bird, at the same 

 time extending my hand for it to perch on, and having "fixed" a gamy 

 grasshopper to walk towards it, when away it would go and the bird would have 

 it in the twinkling of an eye, a species of hawking I much enjoyed. 



And now for the sad part of the story. When out shooting miles from home 

 mypoor bird, as I subsequently found out (though at the time I had my doubts 

 about its being a wild bird), in an evil moment perched in a tree overhead, and 

 being mischievously inclined at the moment, I fired and brought down my pet 

 Drongo, a circumstance I cannot cease regretting even to this day as an ending to 

 so much attachment. 



A. W. MORRIS. 



9.— MIMICRY FOR PROTECTION AND FROM EXAMPLE. 



It has lately struck me that though generally speaking the term mimic is applied 

 to birds and insects that resemble or imitate other animals, either in voice, colour 

 or style of marking, zoologically regarded it needs restrictions. To use one term 

 to denote a multiplicity of manners and ways is to use it laxly, and Professor 

 Meldola, after whom zoologists are inclined to follow, aware that the word 

 mimic has been rather loosely applied, suggested that "the term 2»~otectice 

 resemblance should be applied to the appearances which tend to deceive enemies by 

 their resemblance to motionless (vegetable or mineral) surroundings, the term 

 "mimicry" denoting the resemblance to other animals." I would therefore 

 suggest that while mimic be employed for butterflies, beetles and other insects 

 that either for protection or some other cause take on the appearance of well 

 protected forms, imitation be applied to such animals as copy or voluntarily 

 assume the peculiarities of other creatures. Superficially regarded there is hardly 

 any difference between the words suggested, and yet these hardly perceptible 

 shades of difference add greatly to the perspicuity of meaning. If these be 

 accepted, their mimicry would be the result of an involuntary assumption, while 

 imitation would be a voluntary production, or, in other words, that it would 

 arise from protective causes, this for example. Tims we should say the female 

 of H. missippus " mimics " L. chrysippus ; the above case of C. saularis would b e 

 one of " imitation," and such insects as Phasma, J\fantis and the larva? of many 

 Lepidoptera would assume what Professor Meldola calls protective resemblance, 

 i.e., resembling the leaves and twigs of trees, stones, earth, seeds, &c. 



A. W. MORRIS. 



10.— USES OF THE SCREW PALM (PANDANUZ ODORATISSIMUS}, 



KEVADA, ^^3T. 



In Part 2 of Vol. I. of our Society's Journal there is a paper on the uses of 

 the Screw Palm taken from the journals of the late Mr. Handley Sterndale and 

 read by Mr. R. A. Sterndale on the 7th December 1S85, and also a note on the same 

 paper by Dr. Kirtikar. In either of these is there any mention made of a use to 

 which the dried leaf of the Pandanus is put, which is to spread and polish the 

 lac on children's toy T s, those bright and pretty lotas, humming tops, and so on, 



