VII PARADISEIDAE 543 
chestnut under tail-coverts. The bill is crimson, pinkish, or bluish. 
Sphecotheres is yellow-green or olive-yellow, at times brighter below, 
and is relieved by black, grey, and white, the orbits being yellowish 
or flesh-coloured, the bill blackish. 
These shy, restless, and quarrelsome birds frequent gardens, 
groves, and mangrove swamps, avoiding the ground, flying heavily 
but swiftly from tree to tree, and hopping among the higher 
branches. They eat insects and fruit; and utter flute-like notes, 
varied by mewing calls or “churrs” of alarm. The nest is a pocket 
of bark, grass, and fibres, with the rim woven over two forking 
twigs—leaves, moss, and hair being occasionally added. The 
three to five white or salmon-coloured eggs have dark purplish 
or brown-pink spots, and more rarely streaks; those of Oriolus 
viridis being more dusky with brown and hlac markings. Spheco- 
theres maxillaris makes a shallow nest of twigs, and lays three 
olive or green eges, blotched or zoned with red-brown.1 
Fam. XXII. Paradiseidae.—The Birds of Paradise have no 
rivals in splendour, unless it be the Humming-birds, among which, 
however, there is no such marvellous development of accessory 
plumes. They are undoubtedly allied to the Corvidae, as is evidenced 
in particular by Lycocorax and Manucodia, while these also connect 
the more typical forms with the comparatively plainly garbed 
Bower-birds, often placed in a separate Family, Ptilorhynchidae. 
Few species are as large as Crows, and some are not bigger than 
Thrushes. Whether known to earlier traders or not, the first 
undoubted account of Birds of Paradise published in Europe was 
that of Maximilianus Transylvanus (1525), followed by that of 
Antonio Pigafetta, both relating to a couple of birds brought 
by Magellan’s company from Batchian,” where they were called 
“ Manukdewata,” or “ Birds of the gods.” Natives when preserv- 
ing the skins used to cut off the wings and the feet, a fact which 
gave rise to absurd stories of Paradise-birds (Paradeira apoda) 
never perching, gazing perpetually at the sun (passaros de sol), 
suspending themselves by the tail-feathers, and so forth. The 
hen was also said to lay her eggs on the back of her spouse. 
! For unconscious mimicry of AWimeta (Oriolidae) and Philemon (Meliphagidae), 
cf. A. Newton, Dict. Birds, 1893, pp. 573-574. 
2 Of. A. Newton, Dict. Birds, 1893, pp. 37-40 ; and for the Family generally, op. 
cit. pp- 48-51, 534-536, 779-780, 789-790, Wallace, Malay Arch ipelago, ch. xxxviili., 
Salvadori, Ornitologia Papuasia ce Molucche, and the Monographs of Elliot and Sharpe. 
