174 COMMON BIRDS OF AN INDIAN GARDEN 



vegetation, such as clumps of screw-pines, on the 

 banks of ponds, or out among the tangled jungle 

 of reeds, Nymphasas, Nelumbiums, and other aquatic 

 plants that usually covers so much of the surface 

 of the water. They are by no means shy birds, 

 and may often be seen wandering tranquilly around 

 quite close to groups of native huts, or wading and 

 swimming among the weeds in a pond populous 

 with bathers and water-carriers. Captivity appears 

 to be a very light trial to them, and they seem 

 to be quite contented in very small enclosures 

 entirely devoid of any tangled undergrowths like 

 those which they naturally haunt. Coots, Fulica 

 atra, are by no means so abundant near Calcutta 

 as water-hens, usually preferring the conditions 

 provided by the rice-fields and wide areas of marsh 

 of the open country ; but they may sometimes be 

 seen swimming about in the weedy pools of water 

 that in so many places flank the lines of railway 

 as they emerge from the town. 



Common jacanaV, Metopodius indicus? are rarely 

 to be met with in gardens ; they are so purely 

 aquatic in habit as to demand wider spaces of 

 swamp and weedy water than are ordinarily found 

 in small enclosures. They may, however, often 

 be seen in the Botanic Garden at Shibpur, and 

 used to build regularly every year among the 

 thick growth of weeds covering the surface of a 

 large pond close to the superintendent's house. 



1 They are nearly of the same size as a common redshank. 



