244 Journal of Travel and Natural History 



peculiar to Africa, as generally supposed, there being one species 

 of true Indicator in Borneo, and another in the Sikhim and 

 Bhotan Himmalaya. Of I. variegatus he states that — "With respect 

 to the oft-repeated story of the honey-guide leading persons to the 

 nest of the honey-bee, it is as well to mention that the bird will 

 perform the same antics, and with the same cries, to lead any one 

 to a leopard, wild cat, or snake, or will even follow a dog with the 

 same vociferations." Of I. minor we are told : — - 



"The lesser honey-guide is found on the Knysna ; and Le Vaillant gives the 

 Swartkop and Sunday's Rivers as other localities. It probably extends all 

 along the south-east coast. M. Atmore procured it at Blanco, and writes 

 thus : — ' I have had another good opportunity of watching the habits of I. 

 minor. I used to wonder where they got all the bee's-wax that is usually in 

 their gizzards, and the other day I found it out. There was a male at a bee- 

 hive as busy as possible catching bees. After watching him for some time, my 

 son shot him, and his gizzard was full of bees' legs, with the wax on them. He 

 is held in no repute here as an Indicator ; but I. major is, and he is scarce.' 

 M. Atmore has mistaken the pollen of the bee for wax. The bird's habit of 

 capturing bees like a flycatcher is interesting. In another letter he writes — 

 ' Eggs white, in nests of Picus capensis and Laimodon unidentatus. ' " 



Are we to understand from this that the honey-guides are para- 

 sitic like the true cuckoos, entrusting their eggs to the charge of 

 other species, or that they repair for incubation to the deserted 

 nest-holes of woodpeckers and barbets ? We suspect the latter, 

 and the white eggs are decidedly those of a woodpeckerratherthanof 

 a cuculine bird. Bruce notices the protrusile tongue of the honey- 

 guide ; but M. Atmore writes of its " gizzard," a term which, if 

 properly applied, should intimate a much thicker muscular coat to 

 the stomach than we find either in the woodpeckers, or in any of 

 the diversified cuckoo family. Why has not Mr Layard supplied 

 us with trustworthy information on these points ? As regards 

 Colius he informs us : — 



" Of the three species of this genus found in South Africa, and known by 

 the trivial name of muis-vogel, or 'mouse-bird,' C. erythropus is the only 

 one that occurs in the neighbourhood of Cape-Town. It is not uncommon in 

 gardens during the fruit season, ranging about in small families of six or eight 

 individuals. They fly with a rapid, though laboured flight, generally at a lower 

 level than the object at which they aim, and on nearing it rise upward with a 

 sudden abrupt curve. They creep among the branches like parrots, and hang 

 suspended, head downwards, without inconvenience ; indeed, it is said that 

 they invariably sleep in this position, many of them congregated together in a 

 ball. They are said to breed in holes of trees, laying three or four eggs, some- 

 what rounded at each end, of a dull white colour. In habits, the three species 

 closely resemble each other ; and at the Knysna, where tliey are all to be found, 



