450 BIRDS OF SOUTH AFRICA. 
considerable distance ; I first saw them in July, 1869 (midwinter), 
when the birds, in flocks of from thirty to forty, were still inhabiting 
-their nests, in which they appear to sleep all the year round, adding 
to them each summer as the colony increases. I visited a nest early 
one morning and found it apparently deserted; but on throwing a 
stone or two at it, I heard a gentle chattering, and presently out flew 
a bird, and then another, till the whole family were out. I found 
them afterwards feeding on the ground at some little distance; on 
rising they uttered the same chattering note, and continued it 
during their flight. The nests are very irregular structures, varying 
in size from a wheelbarrowful to a large cartload of coarse sticks 
and grass, the mass forming a very thick and weatherproof roof, in 
the substance of which the separate chambers are formed. The 
number of these varies according to the extent of the colony. The 
apertures of the chambers face downwards, and are barely large 
enough to admit a man’s hand. ‘There is no connection between the 
chambers; and each of them is warmly lined with feathers. In 
February, being again in the district inhabited by these birds, I cut 
a nest or two down and found the young birds mostly flown. One 
chamber only contained callow young and a single unhatched egg, 
greyish-white, indistinctly mottled with sepia-brown. ‘There were 
several nests on one tree, each three or four feet in diameter.” 
Mr. F. H. Guillemard writes as follows :—‘“ The country north of 
the Diamond Fields seems to be the chief habitat of the Social Gros- 
beak, Phileterus socius. Whether this bird has retreated before the 
march of civilization I do not know, but it certainly seems as if it 
were less common now in districts where former travellers, like 
Harris, once found it abundant. Its huge nests, so often described 
by interior travellers, do not need a further allusion here. I faney 
they last for a great number of years, although they are continually 
being repaired by their active little inhabitants. It is curious that 
even the initiated eye is constantly being deceived by these peculiar 
dome-topped structures; at a distance they closely resemble native 
huts, except that the latter are less conspicuous, and occasionally so 
exactly match the colour of the ground that I have more than once 
found myself close to a kraal without having been previously in the 
least aware of its proximity. Like many other creatures living in 
communities, the Social Grosbeak, far from being as amiable as it is 
supposed to be, is anything but averse to a quarrel, and I have often 
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