THE KALI SHAMA 65 



it forgets all fear of man and allows him to 

 come very near. If its keeper, watching in 

 front of the aviary window, stands in the 

 path of the sun s rays, it steps up within 

 a few inches of his feet to get the sun and 

 warble its sweet, merry note. 



Though not dressed in gay plumage, 

 the Indian Robin arrests our attention. 

 One peculiarity about its colora- 

 Coloration tion is that the deeper hue is 

 on the lower parts of its body. 

 Ordinarily we find that, in birds which are 

 not uniformly coloured, the colour of the 

 upper body is deeper than that of the 

 lower. Here, however, the colour-setting 

 is reversed. The exception in this case 

 cannot be without reason. The colour of 

 its upper body is brown. Does not this 

 colour, together with the fact that it lives 

 ill rocky districts where the landscape is 

 also of the same colour for the greater part 

 of the year, suggest protective coloration ? 

 And as the bird is mostly terrestrial in 

 habits, the deeper tint of its lower body 

 becomes less prominent. 



