106 DENIZENS OF THE FOREST 



The nidification of this bird is already a time-worn 

 theme, but we cannot refrain from giving the somewhat 

 sad history of the picture illustrating the species in this 

 work. 



Early one morning, when we were ready to take a 

 photograph at a nest hole which had been discovered, 

 containing young, we could not see the parent birds 

 about, which was strange, as we knew for certain that 

 they had young ones. After waiting a while one of the 

 old birds appeared, and perched close to the nest, then 

 flew away screaming. 



We got the camera into position by building a platform 

 of logs and stones, as the nest was about 8 feet above 

 the ground and just below it was a steep waterfall. 



One of the party next picked up a dead young one 

 amongst the undergrowth below the nest, and we only 

 then noticed that a swarm of bees was issuing from 

 and entering the hole. After exercising a little patience 

 we obtained the desired snap, and then proceeded to cut 

 away the tree-trunk, after smoking out the bees. Some 

 heavy labour with an axe enabled us to effect an opening 

 and the remaining young bird was extracted. The poor 

 creature was much swollen and red, the skin being one 

 large blister, resulting from the stings of the bees. It 

 was dosed with ammonia and recovered sufficiently to 

 ravenously devour some fruit, but it never entirely re- 

 covered, and died a few days later. 



Some time afterwards we visited the nest and cut the 

 tree above and below the hole to see if there was any 

 other opening for the birds to enter, as the one seen in 

 the photograph was very small, being only 1 in. in 

 diameter, neither was it built up, as is usually the case. 

 It is somewhat of a mystery to us how the old birds 

 entered that hole, as we could not discover another en- 



