^°i92?'] WILvSOX, Papua, the Land of Birds. 275 



There is a Ue\il I'ird in l^apua, one that makes a weird moan 

 or inhuman wail, makinj,^ the hstener, be he native, shiver; and 

 no man lias ever seen it. \\hite men have often stalked the sound, 

 but without ever seeing anything ; and the natives fear to try : 

 they treat it as an ill-omen, and refuse to hunt wallaby or go 

 fishing after the Devil-Bird has spoken. I have been told, how- 

 ever, that once a shooting boy shot one, and it was merely a large 

 Pigeon, but I cannot verify the story. 



One evening, while sitting beside a jungle pool, I was amused 

 by watching a small flock of Jacanas (Lotus-l>irds) running 

 along the leaves of water plants. Their enormous feet seemed 

 to make their going easy, but no one could call it graceful. Their 

 great advantage over other wading birds, such as Coots and Bit- 

 terns, made them the bullies of the pool ; more than once, I saw 

 them drive away larger rivals, but their appearance is mildness 

 personified. 



Parrots were less common than I expected to find them, but 

 one, the Pygmy Parrot, fascinated me. \\'hen I first saw these 

 birds, I thought they must be Finches, but their un-Finchlike 

 behaviour soon brought out the telescope and exposed the error. 

 A native caught one, and a spider was found considerably larger 

 than the Parrot, which I did not measure, but it could not have 

 exceeded 2^ inches in length. This little fellow attacked my 

 thumb with all the ferocity of a White Cockatoo. 



A never-to-be-forgotten exhibition of flight was given me one 

 day by a pair of Brown Quail. I happened to be strolling along 

 a native track towards the village, when I noticed three Quails 

 busy dusting themselves on the path ahead of me. The sight 

 was not new, so I went on. Here just on the left was a grove 

 of betel-nut trees, almost within a foot of the path ; now a betel- 

 nut grows straight upright, and these were some 30 feet high. 

 The Quails rose vertically, topped the trees, and then wheeled 

 away out of sight. I never imagined that any bird could rise at 

 an angle of 30 in 1, and stood amazed. 



The Superb Warbler of Papua is slightly larger than the Vic- 

 torian Blue-Wren {Mahirus cyaneus), and in colour scheme I 

 prefer the hen bird to the female of any other Wren- Warbler, 

 it is of a delicate shade of brown with pale blue head and rump. 

 These birds I found very shy, keeping deep hidden in the cane 

 grass or lawyer vines of the jungle, but on being called by the 

 noise of kissing made by the lips, they come fussily alert to make 

 inquiries. 



Grey-headed Xuns work over the cane grass, or cocoanut plan- 

 tations in large flocks, all moving after a single leader and busy 

 searching the soil. For no apparent reason the whole flock will 

 suddenly take flight, and settle somewhere near by. A much 

 rarer Black Xun I saw only once. 



It became my fate to miss a schooner, which .should have car- 

 ried me to Port ^Moresby, and spend eleven days alone with native 

 boys on Yule Island, a mile or two ofif the mainland. Here, with 



