118 GARDEN AND AVlAKY BIKDS. 



The Scarlet-backed Flower-pecker {Dicaum cnien 

 fafuni) is repicbented in Fig. 5 of Plate I. Although 

 l)ai('ly largor than a big bee, the male — which is the sex 

 tigiired — is a very showy little thing, with his cream- 

 coloured breast and glossy black upper plumage decorated 

 by a broatl splash of scarlet from c^o^^^l to tail. The 

 hen is olive-gTcen with a black tail, and a dash of scarlet 

 (Ml the back just at the root of it. The young are like her. 

 The exact range of this minute bird is not known, but it 

 is not uncommon in the eastern parts of India, and hi 

 Burma, whence it spreads even to South China and Sumatra. 

 It is common about Calcutta, but I never saw it wild there. 

 It breeds from March onwards, buildhig a little oval nest 

 of grass and the down of plants, which is hung from the 

 tip of a hi«,di branch ; the two or three eggs it contains are 

 I)ure white. 



Occasionallv this bird might liave been obtained from 

 the late Mr. W. Kutledge, the only dealer I have known 

 to have it. When several are in an ordinary cage together, 

 they seem to be peaceable enough, but I found on buying 

 two cocks and a hen and turning them out into a large 

 verandah cage, that the cocks fought like fiends, and soon 

 Ijoth were dead. They appeared not to care for the 

 company of other little birds, but were not aggressive to 

 them. Mr. K. W. Harper succeeded in sending this 

 species to tlic London Zoological Gardens, and also the 

 still tinier Tickell's Flower-pecker {Dicaum eri/throrln/n- 

 rhum) a plain drab bird with a flesh-coloured bill ; the 

 latter was the first bird <.l iliis family to reach England 

 alive. A lari/e ca'^e is more suitable for birds like these 



