47 



Bir& IRotce from (Banibia. 



By E. HoPKiNSON, M.A., I\I.B., D.S.O. 



>^URING my wanderings about this country as 

 I I Protectorate Medical Officer, (or "Itinerant 

 r-Ly Doctor," a title by which I have been 

 addressed), I have naturally been very interes- 

 ted in, and at different times have jotted down rough 

 notes on, the different species of birds which I have 

 come across. These I have in the following pages 

 endeavoured to arrange in a systematic order, and, 

 though they contain no new facts or anything of scien- 

 tific value, I hope they will interest our readers, and 

 give some idea of the bird-life of this tropical colony, 

 mainly a mighty river and its banks, which has the 

 distinction of being our most northern West African 

 possession. 



I will commence with the PLOCEID^, as the 

 family which contains the typical West African cage- 

 birds, and which therefore is likely to be of more 

 immediate interest to the majority of the members of 

 the F. B. C. ; but as in a previous issue I gave some 

 account of most of the Gambian representatives of this 

 family, I will here content myself with some more 

 general remarks. 



From the nature of their favourite haunts in a 

 state of nature, they can be roughly divided into three 

 groups : 



(i) Birds which frequent the native towns, and 

 everywhere seem to enjoy the society of man ; namely 

 the Common Firefinch, the Combassou, and some of 

 the large yellow Weavers (^Hyphantoniis). 



(2) Birds of the cultivated or cleared ground 

 round the towns ; Whydahs and Weavers (especially 

 when out of colour). Bronze and Magpie Mannikins, 

 Cordon Bleus and the other species of Waxbill. 



