Re 
356 CUCULIFORMES CHAP. 
and Polynesia, the black males are barely distinguishable, but 
the females vary, and are black, brown, rufous, and white. J. 
honorata, the noisy Indian Koél, has a loud melodious or hoarse 
whistling note, supposed to portend rain; it feeds on fruit, and 
lays from one to four greenish eggs with brown and grey blotches 
in nests of Crows. £. melanorhyncha is the “ foreteller at night ” 
of Celebes." The extraordinary Scythrops novae hollandiae, or 
Channel-bill, of Australia, Papuasia, and the Moluccas, has a grey 
head, brownish back, and whitish under parts with indistinct dusky 
bars, the tail exhibiting a subterminal blackish and a terminal 
white band. The large maxilla has two lateral grooves, the bare 
lores and orbits are scarlet. This big bird flies hke a Hawk, and 
is possibly parasitic ; while eggs, taken from the oviduct, are white 
with pinkish-brown spots. The weird cry or shriek is sylabled 
“krok,” and the flocks feed on fruits and insects. 
Coccyzus americanus, the Yellow-billed Cuckoo of America, 
has occurred in Britain, and ranges from the Great Plains, Canada, 
and New Brunswick to Argentina; it is an arboreal species, pair- 
ing and building—apparently twice a year—a slight flat nest of 
twigs, grass, and moss, lined with leaves. It lays from three to 
five light greenish eggs, and the hen feigns lameness when danger 
threatens the young. C. occidentalis is a more western form. 
C. erythrophthalmus, the American Black-billed Cuckoo, has been 
killed in Ireland and Italy. The coloration in the eight members 
of this genus is brownish-grey, relieved by rufous, the under parts 
being buff or white. 
Sub-fam. 2. Centropodinae—This group comprises only the 
thirty or more large Coucals (Centropus) of the Ethiopian Region, 
Egypt, Madagascar, India, and the countries thence to China, 
Papuasia, and Austraha.  C. sinensis, the Crow-Pheasant, extend- 
ing from India and Ceylon to China, is black with purple and 
green reflexions, the mantle being chestnut; C. wnirufus of the 
Philippines is entirely rufous. They are strong-billed, long- 
legged birds with terrestrial tendencies, noisy yet often shy, which 
fly heavily, run, chinb, leap, or glide with up-turned tail about 
the trees in forests and jungles, and utter a mellow “ hoo-too ” or 
a chuckle. The food consists of insects and their larvae, molluses, 
reptiles, small mammals, and nesthng birds. They make a large 
globular nest of twigs and leaves, or even of rushes, grass, and rags, 
1 For superstitions connected with Celebes Cuckoos, see Meyer, bis, 1879, pp. 67-70. 
