410 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1892. 



species of Hornbills feeding the female, whom he has imprisoned during 

 the period of incubation in a hollow tree. I never pass it that I do not 

 think of what Wallace has said of the habit in his Malay Archipelago 



(p. 147): 



I had sent my hunters to shoot and while I was at hreakfast they returned, bring- 

 ing me a fine large male of the Buceroa bicornis, which one of them assured me he 

 had shot while feeding the female, which was shut up in a hole iu a tree. I had 

 often read of this curious habit, and immediately returned to the place, accompa- 

 nied by several of the natives. After crossing a stream and a bog, we found a large 

 tree leaning over some water, and on its lower side, at a height of about 20 feet, 

 appeared a small hole, audAvhat looked like a quantity of mud, which 1 was assured 

 had been used iu stopping up the largo hole. After a while we heard the harsh cry 

 of a bird inside, and could see the white extremity of its beak put out. I offered a 

 rupee to anyone who would go up and get out the bird, with the egg or young oue, 

 but they all declared it was too difficult and they were afraid to try. I therefore 

 very reluctantly came away. In about an hour afterward, much to my surprise, a 

 tremendous loud, hoarse screaming was heard, and the bird was brought me, to- 

 gether with a young one which had been found iu the hole. This was a most curi- 

 ous object, as large as a pigeon, but without a pa tide of plumage on any part of it. 

 It was exceedingly plump and soft, and with a semitransparent skin, so that it 

 looked more like a bag of jelly with head and feet stuck on than like a real bird. 



The extraordinary habit of the male in plastering up the female with her egg and 

 feeding her during the whole time of incubation and till the young one is fledged, is 

 common to several of the large hornbills, and is one of those strange facts in natural 

 history which are "stranger than fiction." 



A very favorable commencement has been made at the National 

 Museum of illustrating our own native birds by similar methods, and 

 it would not be easy to overestimate the value and interest that 

 attach to so important a step. We have already in one handsome 

 single case a pair of shrikes with their nest and young in a thorn-apple 

 bush, while upon several of the spines of the hitter are suspended vari- 

 ous insects and a small mammal, showing the habit of those interesting 

 birds in nature of thus impaling such creatures. Others are in the 

 course of making, and still others in contemplation. A pair of Wood 

 Ducks with their real nest, taken from some lofty tree, is a good sub- 

 ject for some enterprising artist, and many others suggest themselves 

 to us. There were magnificent groups of our birds sent on to the 

 Columbian Exposition at Chicago, and when these are returned, as 

 they Mill be, it will form a fine basis for such a collection to be added 

 to in the future. I fear I must leave a great deal unsaid here that I 

 would like to say, but it is to be devoutly hoped that the wide interest 

 our people are taking in such matters, and the national desire of build- 

 ing up a National Museum at our fair capital, will induce our Govern- 

 ment to open the public purse to the extent of bestowing the room 

 required for the proper exhibition of this series, even to the giving of a 

 large and suitable building, now so much needed through the rapid 

 increase and accumulation of such treasures. 



This will be the more necessary inasmuch as within a few years past, 

 through the wise foresight of Mr. Goode, another very important de- 



