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floor of the cage. In both cases the bird’s droppings fell through the

bars or wire-netting, thus keeping the birds clean. On board ship space

has to be economized to such an extent that, even when the cages are

cleaned once daily, but for this barred floor arrangement the birds

would soon become very dirty.


Keeping insectivorous birds for forty-nine days without such foods

as dried flies, ants, cocoons, powdered pupae, gentles, and mealworms

may seem to be no easy matter, but very finely minced lean mutton

and hard-boiled egg, added to cooked pea-meal and “ ghee ” (refined

butter), answered the purpose very well. I found that, by mashing the

hard-boiled egg on a plate with the back of a fork, the particles of egg

were of a convenient size. Jay-thrushes, Crow-pheasants, Blue Magpies,

and Tree Pies received small pieces of raw meat, in addition to the pea-

meal. As I have a high opinion of fruit as an article of diet for birds,

this was always provided when procurable, very few birds in the

collection being non-frugivorous. When fresh fruit was unobtainable,

dates, previously moistened with warm water, were relished by the

birds. The Chukor Partridges always looked for their daily allowance

of a small piece of raw meat. The Vultures and Kites were fed upon

the entrails of the bullocks and sheep slaughtered for the tigers and other

Carnivora on board. The only seed-eating bird—not counting game¬

birds—in the collection was a Black-crested Bunting. The s.s. Gamana ,

being a new ship, on her maiden voyage, no such luxuries for the birds

as cockroaches were to be obtained. Any birds that died on board

were given to the predatory birds or to the small Carnivora.


Unfortunately a civet-cat escaped during the voyage, through its

cage being thrown down in rough weather and broken. It was three or

four days before the animal was recaptured, but in that time it destroyed

some of the rarest birds in the collection, viz. Bengal Pitta, Green¬

breasted Pitta, Niltava Flycatcher, and Yellow-eyed Babbler. The

Green-breasted Pitta would probably have been new to the London Zoo,

so its loss was particularly annoying. One of the Jungle Babblers

opened its cage-door on two or three occasions and escaped, but this

species is so decidedly gregarious that it was an easy matter to

recapture it.


Some of the Sarus Cranes were particularly spiteful, on one occasion



