DICRURUS AFER 175 
siderable height. It is built of rootlets and small flexible 
twigs, lined with finer rootlets and tendrils, occasionally with 
horsehair. The eggs, usually four in number, vary con- 
siderably in colour and shape. The ground colour varies 
from white to deep salmon pink, and this is generally some- 
what sparingly spotted, sometimes in a zone, with different 
shades of purple, lilac, or salmon. In measurement they 
average 1°00 x O70.” Erlanger, J. f. O. 1905, p. 703, 
has described several varieties of the eggs. 
When I was in Natal I saw these Drongos, generally in 
pairs, perched on the topmost boughs of the scattered 
bushes, in the open country, and frequently one would rise 
in a graceful amble in the air after some passing insect, 
returning to the same perch to enjoy leisurely its capture. 
In Gazaland, where there are two native Zulu races, Myr. 
Swynnerton informs us that it is called by the Ishindowo 
“Tndhenguti,” and by the Singuni “Intengu”’; and further 
writes: “‘The Rock-vogel’ (Smoke-bird) of the local Dutch 
is so called on account of its being always to the fore, in 
flocks of 5,8, or even 11 individuals, when a grass-fire is in 
progress, dashing backwards and forwards through the smoke 
- after the fleeing insects ; the crops of two, shot in June while 
thus engaged, contained a wasp, a cicada and numerous 
beetles and flies. The habit of this bird, already referred 
to, of assuming the leadership of the flocks of small birds 
so often met with in the open bush has led to its being 
called by the natives the ‘Induna yezinyone’ (General of 
the birds). It will attack owls, hawks and snakes which 
approach its charge, and even when one of them has 
seized a small bird it will frequently succeed in making it 
drop its prey, swooping down on the back of the marauder’s 
neck and generally harassing and blinding it. According to 
the natives a Drongo is never bitten by a snake, owing to 
its confining its attack to the back of the head and carefully 
