26 THE HUMAN SIDE OF BIRDS 



after the dead swallow is thus buried will the 

 other members of his family continue to construct 

 their nests in adjoining caves. If this is not intelli- 

 gence, what shall we call it? 



The flamingo is a peculiar mound-builder with 

 bright scarlet plumage, a very large neck and legs, 

 and a bill so bent in the middle that it appears to 

 be deformed. The flamingo belongs to an ancient 

 family of birds whose living members number only 

 one-third as many varieties as were known among 

 the fossil forms. Dampier, in 1683, gave a strange 

 account of these mound-builders : 



"The flamingoes build their nests in shallow 

 ponds, where there is much mud, which they scrape 

 together, making little hillocks, like small islands, 

 appearing out of the water, a foot and a half high 

 from the bottom. They make the foundation of 

 these hillocks broad, bringing them up tapering to 

 the top, where they leave a small hollow pit to lay 

 their eggs in; and when they either lay their eggs, 

 or hatch them, they stand all the while, not on the 

 hillock, but closely by it with their long legs on the 

 ground and in the water, resting themselves against 

 the hillock, and covering the hollow nest upon it 

 with their rumps. For their legs are very long, 

 and building thus, as they do, upon the ground they 

 could neither draw their legs conveniently into the 



