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chamber about four feet, and an outer flight nearly eight feet,

high. In order to clean either division, it is considered desir¬

able to drive him into the other, for the doors are large, and he

is now a brazen-faced Bob, and hides himself only on the appear¬

ance of strangers. But Bob was perverse, and would not allow

himself to be driven from the outer chamber, which consequently

had to remain uncleaned for some days. On May 9, I decided

that such open rebellion and defiant disobedience was bad for the

discipline of the establishment, and that Bob must be brought

to book forthwith. Our bird-woman having brought all her

things ready, I told her to look out, and produced from under

the flap of my coat a short-handled bird-net; “ Oh where —?

GOOD GRACIOUS HE’S GONE,” exclaimed the startled

woman, staring all about the larger outer aviary to see what had

become of Bob who, on the production of the net, had “ melted

into air, into thin air, and . . . left not a rack behind.”


Trained as my eyes had been all my life to watch birds and

animals, in olden days an expert shot and a good cricketer, I

should have deemed it impossible for a bird as large as a pigeon

to have dropped down perpendicularly about three feet, and then

to have darted off at a right angle to get under his shed, without

being seen ; but so it was. We were within a few feet and had

our eyes on him, and yet his movement was so rapid that our

eyes had been unable to take it in and detect it. The upper part

of the outward extension, where the bird was, is constructed

entirely of wire-netting, and the woman thought he had burst

clean through and had fled off. I knew that that was impos¬

sible ; but I must confess that I felt very “ creepy,” and scanned

the outer division of his house most carefully, before I cautiously

and nervously opened the door. Bob is a wise bird in his genera¬

tion, for since that day he has obeyed orders with alacrity, and it

has not again been necessary to produce the net for the same

purpose.


When transferred to the garden, Bob at first set himself to

catch the birds which came near his house; but he quickly saw

that it couldn’t be done, and for some weeks seemed to think no

more about them. The only bird of whom he took any notice

was an immature male Regent (Sericulus mclhius), whose pre¬

sence he invariably recognises with a lively chattering, some¬

times like that of the Missel-Thrush when its young are

approached, but whether a chattering of peace or war I did not

for some time know. They are both loquacious ; and I thought

that perhaps each recognised in the other a kindred spirit, or

possibly a rival for vocal honours. Nevertheless I regarded it



