DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF SCOPUS 



and extends to Madagascar. It has the reputation of 

 being a bird of evil omen. In Africa it is held to be 

 sacred and to possess the power of witchcraft. There 

 is indeed something portentous and solemn about the 

 behaviour of all these herons and bitterns, which easily 

 accounts for the origin of such legends. Scopus is 

 mainly crepuscular in habit, and is known to utter a 

 croaking cry, which is significant, as will be seen pre- 

 sently, of its place in the ornithological temple. It 

 feeds upon fish, frogs, lizards, and insects, and appears 

 to enjoy an aesthetic sense not possessed by its immedi- 

 ate allies, but paralleled in other groups of birds ex- 

 celled, of course, in the well-known bower birds. It 

 adorns its nest in fact with buttons, fragments of pot- 

 tery, bits of glass, and any other bright-looking objects 

 which happen to come in its way. The nest itself is 

 eminently worthy of note. It is huge in size, and com- 

 plicated in design. Instead of being content with one 

 compartment alone, in which all the offices of nest life 

 are performed, Scopus requires no less than three sepa- 

 rate chambers, all included in the vast dome situated 

 upon the fork of a tree which it inhabits. This is an 

 unheard-of luxury in the bird world, especially as the 

 umbre does not take in any lodgers, such as cuckoos. 

 It is only recently that this bird has been acquired by 

 the Zoological Society. The first specimen was ex- 

 hibited in 1880. To most persons the outward appear- 

 ance of Scopus suggests a stork. And it is a fact that in 

 a large number of points Scopus is decidedly stork-like. 

 On the whole its skeleton recalls those birds. But in 

 other features of its anatomy the bird is as distinctly 

 inclined to the heron build, and, in short, it is a perfect 

 instance of a bird which is intermediate between two 

 distinct families ; and this is one, and that not a bad 

 reason, for putting together the storks and herons, as is 

 usually, but not always, done by ornithologists. If 



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