NEST OF INDIAN TAILOR BIRD \VO0I> 351 



on all the airs and graces of the true wren, rapidly sounding his clear 

 double note, "te-weet, te-weet," so that all the world may hear. 



Except as a wedding garment one can hardly understand the use 

 of the long tail of the male sutonus, especially as he is a good hus- 

 band and takes a great interest in the raising of the family. When 

 it is his turn to sit on, or in, the pocket-like nest he presents a most 

 curious appearance: his long tail must perforce be applied all along 

 his back so that it and his beak almost meet, surely an uncomfortable 

 position for a long siesta. 



AVhen she (because only the female bird constructs the nest) can 

 find them, the tailor bird prefers certain favorite trees for building 

 her nest. Among these is the so-called lettuce tree, Pesonia alba, 

 from the appearance of its pale yellow foliage and because the leaves 

 are sometimes used as a salad. This is a small evergreen from 25 to 

 30 feet high. Draccena and other umbrageous trees are also utilized. 



If the tree chosen has very long and large leaves the bird may be 

 satisfied with a single leaf, or at most two leaves; if the leaves are 

 of medium size or small a larger number are sewn or riveted together. 



Dewar, in his work on Birds of the Indian Plains, details the con- 

 struction of a nest by the tailor bird from a single leaf, as witnessed 

 bj^ Mr. A. G. Pinto. Some of the operations he describes are quite 

 apparent in the Sigiriya nest, some are not. 



The first thing she did was to make with her sliarp little beak a number of 

 inmctures along each edge of the leaf. Having thus prepared the leaf, she 

 disappeared for a little and returned with a strand of cobweb. One end of 

 this she wound roimd the narrow part of the leaf that separated one of the 

 ininctures from the edge ; having done this, she carried the loose end of the 

 strand acra'^s the under surface of the leaf to a puncture on the opposite side, 

 where she attached it to the leaf, and thus drew the edges a little way to- 

 gether. She then proceeded to connect most of the other punctures with those 

 opposite them, so that the leaf took the form of a tunnel converging to a 

 point. The under surface of the leaf formed the roof and sides of the tunnel 

 or arch. There was no floor to this, since the edges of the leaf did not meet 

 below, the gap between them being bridged by strands of cobweb. 



When lining the nest, the bird made a number of punctures in tlie body of 

 the leaf, through which she poked the lining with her beak, the object being to 

 keep the lining in fiitii. All this time the margins of the leaf that formed the 

 nest liad been held together by the thinnest strands of cobweb, and it is a 

 mystery how these can have stood the strain. However, before the lining was 

 completed, the bird proceeded to strengthen them by connecting the punctures 

 on opposite edges of the leaf with threads of cotton. Her modus operandi was 

 to push one end of a thread through a puncture on the opposite edge of tht? 

 leaf. The cotton used is soft and frays easily, so that the part of it forced 

 through a tiny aperture issues as a fluffy knob, which looks like a knot and 

 is usually taken as such. As a matter of fact, the bird makes no knots ; she 

 merely forces a portion of the cotton strand through a puncture, and the 

 silicon of the leaf catches the strands of cotton and prevents them from 

 slipping. Sometimes the cotton threads are long enough to admit of their 

 being passed to and fro, in which case the bird uses the full length. 



