VI BUCEROTIDAE 393 
the small opening left, and is even said to knock with his bill 
to attract her attention as he clings to the bark. He shews 
great anxiety about his charge, and the hen screams and bites 
if molested. Various members of the Family expand the tail 
and inflate the throat when courting; some thrive fairly 
well as pets; while Aceros nipalensis of India, and Dichoceros 
bicornis, the Homrai, ranging thence to the Malay countries, are 
said to be excellent eating. The latter is sacred to Vishnu; the 
immured female of Rhytidoceros subruficollis serves as a type of 
virtue to the Burmese; and natives believe that the plaster for 
the holes is composed of gum and earth from the four quarters of 
the globe. In South Africa the Fingoes think that their cattle 
will contract disease if Hornbills are shot; Kafirs consider that 
drought will cease if one of them is sunk under water and drowned ; 
Ovampos pretend that the eges are too brittle to be handled. 
Some nineteen genera may be admitted, from the Ethiopian, 
Indian, and Australian Regions, with about seventy species, more 
than thirty of which occur in each of the first two areas; a 
couple inhabit Celebes, and one ranges over the Moluccas and 
Papuasia to the Solomon Islands. None inhabit Australia. 
The somewhat scanty plumage is usually black, white, and 
grey; but a greenish or bluish tinge, or rufous heads and lower 
parts are not unfrequent. Crests are present, except In Bucorvus ; 
Ceratogymna has a gular wattle; Berenicornis and Ortholophus 
exhibit long upcurved loral plumes; while the orbits and throat 
are more or less naked, and usually of brilliant colours, these with 
the bill and casque being often a distinguishing mark between 
the sexes. The last develops gradually in the duller young. 
Rhinoplax vigil of the Malay countries, termed the Helmet 
Hornbill, has a line down the back and the neck naked and red. 
The casque is yellow in front and red behind, and is much used 
by Eastern artists for carving and making brooches.  Lereni- 
corms comatus, of the same districts, has a moderate black keeled 
casque, and bare blue orbits and throat. The female exhibits 
less white. Bycanistes buccinator of East Africa has a large 
blackish furrowed casque and purple naked areas.  Lophoceros 
nasutus of North-East and West Africa, has the bill and rudi- 
mentary casque black, with a yellow streak on the maxilla and 
several oblique yellow ridges on the mandible, the bare orbits 
apparently grey. In the female the bill shews red in place of black. 
