Birds in Relation to their Prey. 65 



eat the third and fourth ; he turned his back and remained 

 most of the time with it turned, refusing to look round. A 

 fifth (he had now turned round) he refused with auger 

 repeatedly, though he readily ate an Acrcm areca ^ . 



B, on the other hand, ate greedily 3 Acrcea natalica, 3 A. 

 areca and 3 A. acara, and seemed quite prepared to go on 

 eatino-. 



Comment. I think the experiments of March 3rd and 5th 

 taken together indicate that Amauris is unpleasanter to these 

 birds than Acrcea. The fact that A ate so many of the former 

 genus before commencing to refuse them is likely to have 

 been in part the result of his relative inexperience of it. 



As in the other experiment, both birds had been fed up on 

 locusts half an hour before. 



531. March 10. — Both birds were fed on migratory 

 locusts till they would accept no more. Soon afterwards I 

 gave A two Amauris ocldea with only one wing (right h.w.) 

 attached, ile ate two, the second with some hesitation, a 

 third after five minutes, and refused a fourth with unmis- 

 takable annoyance repeatedly. 



B ate two Danaida chrysippus, and five minutes later 

 refused a third repeatedly, with signs of annoyance (again 

 only one wing). 



To reassure the birds I gave them Catopsilias. A ale his, 

 first breaking it up well and making quite an efl^ort to get 

 rid of the stitf wings. Acrseas and Danaines, with more 

 pliable wings than this Pierine, are swallowed whole. But 

 B^s Catopsilia escaped, and A at once set off in chase of it' 

 He seized it time after time by the wings as it was fluttering 

 about the cage, and each time at once threw it up in his 

 usual fashion in order to catch it in the back of his throat — 

 a feat at which he is very skilful. But each time the bill 

 clapped to, and to the bird's sitrprise, nothing reached his 

 throat — and the butterfly, more active to escape than the 

 species he was used to, was fluttering at the other end of 

 the cage ! At last he succeeded in capturing and eating it 

 in the same manner as the first. 



B now ate one, though with rather more suspicion than A; 



5 



