Birds of Madagascar. 417 



deficient in the power of producing sweet sounds of a very 

 pleasing character and in considerable variety of note ; and, 

 as we shall see, there are some few whose song has even been 

 considered to resemble that of our European Nightingale. 

 In several accounts which have been given by travellers of 

 their journeys through various parts of the country, refer- 

 ence is made to the silence of the woods, to the paucity of 

 animal-life, and to the very few sounds heard either from 

 beast or bird. Now, while it is quite true that the animal- 

 life of Madagascar is very scanty, I am disposed to think 

 that these descriptions have been somewhat exaggerated, and 

 the reason probably is that most journeys have been taken 

 during the colder season, when the woods are comparatively 

 silent. But they certainly are not so at all times of the 

 year ; and I find in a journal of my own the following re- 

 marks upon the abundance of bird-life in the woods, when 

 travelling from Mahanoro to Imerina in the mouth of No- 

 vember 1883 : — " I noticed that the forest was by no means 

 so silent as I had remarked at other times when passing- 

 through it. Former journeys, however, were made in the 

 colder winter months of the year, but now that the warm 

 weather is approaching, some bird or other was almost always 

 heard. Every quarter of a mile or so we heard the constant 

 and noisy call of the Cuckoo {Kcmkafotra) , kow-kow, kow-kow, 

 repeated three or four times ; then the flute-like call of 

 another Cuckoo, the Tolbho, whose mellow notes were heard 

 all the way from the- coast to the forest ; also the chirp and 

 whistle of the RaiJovy, or King Crow, as well as the inces- 

 sant twitter of many small birds. Then came in now and 

 then the long-drawn-out melancholy cries of the Lemurs high 

 up among the trees.^^ 



So again, in memoranda of a stay at Ambohidratrimo, at 

 the edge of the upper forest, in December 1884, occurs the 

 following : — " Here we sat down [on the margin of a forest- 

 stream], enjoying thoroughly the beauty of the woods, and 

 especially the singing of the birds. Never before had I heard 

 in a Madagascar forest so many difierent notes, or so constant 

 a sound of bird-life. Besides this there was the low undertone 



