THE BONANA STARLING. 81 



als, is made much deeper and of slighter texture. 

 The circumference is marked out by a number of 

 these pensile twigs, that descend on each side like 

 ribs, supporting the whole, their thick foliage at 

 the same time completely concealing the nest from 

 view. The depth in this case is increased to four 

 or five inches, and the whole is made much slight- 

 er. These long pendant branches, being sometimes 

 twelve and even fifteen feet in length, have a large 

 sweep in the wind, and render the first of these pre- 

 cautions necessary to prevent the eggs or young 

 from being thrown out ; and the close shelter afford- 

 ed by the remarkable thickness of the foliage is no 

 doubt the cause of the latter. Two of these nests, 

 such as I have here described, are now lying before 

 me, and exhibit not only art in the construction, but 

 judgment in adapting their fabrication so judiciously 

 to their particular situations. If the actions of birds 

 proceeded, as some would have us believe, from the 

 mere impulses of that thing called instinct, individ- 

 uals of the same species would uniformly build their 

 nest in the same manner, wherever they might hap- 

 pen to fix it ; but it is evident from these just men- 

 tioned, and a thousand such circumstances, that they 

 reason, a priori, from cause to consequences, provi- 

 dently managing with a constant eye to future ne- 

 cessity and convenience."* 



According to Buffon and Latham, the bonana star- 

 ling (Icterus bonana) is another of the tailors. It in- 

 habits Martinico, Jamaica, and other West India isl- 

 ands, and builds a nest of a very curious construc- 

 tion, if it can justly be called building. The mate- 

 rials which it uses are fibres and leaves, which it 

 shapes into the fourth part of a globe, and sews the 

 whole with great art to the under part of a bonana 

 leaf, so that the leaf makes one side of the nest.f 



But the most celebrated bird of this division is 



* Wilson, Amer. Ornith., v., 50. 



t Latham, General Hist, of Birds, iii., 118. 



