ALIEN BIRDS A CURSE 127 



town ; in fact, the original avifauna is threatened 

 with extinction. These mynahs have spread even 

 as far as the Cascade Estate, but in the town itself 

 they are in such numbers that every garden and 

 tree is covered with them. 



The Madagascar weaver bird* has also, most 

 unfortunately, been introduced. The history of 

 this stupid act, as told me on good authority, 

 is that two neighbours went to law concerning 

 the ownership of a certain field which each claimed 

 as his property. The loser, to be revenged on 

 his adversary, brought from Madagascar a cage 

 full of weaver birds, which he liberated on his 

 neighbour's land. In any case, whether this 

 account of the origin of the birds be true or not, 

 the effect of their introduction has been that it is 

 now impossible to grow any rice or grain on 

 Mahe, and at the present time these " weavers ' 

 are, next to the mynah, the commonest land- 

 birds. 



Nearly all the indigenous land-birds of the 

 Seychelles are peculiar to the group, and one 

 species of sunbirdf is found only on Mahe, the 

 other islands being inhabited by a somewhat 

 similar species, which differs in that it has the 

 tufts of feathers on the breast of a fiery-red colour 

 instead of yellow. Both species are otherwise 

 dull brownish-grey, and are thus very different 



* Foudia madagascariensis. 



f Cinnyris mahei. "Bull. B.O.C.," Vol. XVI., p. 106. 



