108 ONYCIIOGNATHUS MORIO 



baobab-trees for their nests, and to the selected trees the pairs 

 resort, both morning and evening, some time before nesting 

 commences." 



The species is apparently abundant throughout Nyasaland, 

 and Bohm met with it along the shore of Lake Tanganyika, 

 where he remarked their peculiar melodious song, and tliat 

 they left the water, as night approached, to roost in the cliffs. 

 Sir Harry Johnston writes from Kilimanjaro : " Met with in 

 small flocks of five or six. They utter a low pleasing crj' or soft 

 whistle, and frequent small thickets." Among Mr. Jackson's 

 notes I find the following observation made in April, 189G : 

 " Large flocks of these birds were observed flying across the 

 Kedong Valley, from west to east." In Somaliland, according 

 to Mr. Lort Phillips, these Chestnut-winged Starlings "frequent 

 the highest part of the Goolis range, and are always to be 

 found in the neighbourhood of the precipitous cliffs which 

 crown the range, and are in many places quite perpendicular 

 for some hundreds of feet. These cliffs are studded with 

 wind-worn cavities, varying in size from a pigeon-hole to a 

 good-sized cavern. In the former the ' Morios ' make their 

 homes, flying in and out after the manner of Jackdaws, and 

 indeed, when seen from above, l.ying flat at the edge of the 

 cliff, the bird, with his grey head and noisy cry, greatly 

 resembles the familiar ' Jack.' The larger holes are tenanted 

 by Vultures, Hawks, Eagles and Owls, and seem to be a 

 general breeding-place for Northern Somaliland, as from the 

 top of the cliffs the land slopes away southwards hundreds of 

 miles, and forms a vast undulating plain, while towards the 

 north there is a rapid fall of 0,000 feet in the short space 

 of forty miles which intervenes between the Goolis and the 

 sea." 



Heuglin met with them in South Kordofan, Fazogl, 

 and nearly as far north as Barka, in pairs or small parties, 



