182 COMMON BIRDS OF AN INDIAN GARDEN 



persistently chattering every morning and evening. 

 Nowadays, at all events, it is clearly not a sexual 

 call, as it is in full force when the birds arrive in 

 autumn, many months before the approach of the 

 breeding season, and continues almost unabated until 

 they leave for their nesting grounds in the following 

 summer. It does not seem to be a lure- call. Indeed, 

 whilst a bird is chattering, he seems to be too much 

 absorbed in the performance to have any attention 

 to spare, and, during the course of his busiest 

 hawking throughout the day, he is usually quite 

 silent. From the fact that the chattering is par- 

 ticularly emphatic and frequent both when the bird 

 first arrives and again towards the time of their 

 departure, it is possible that the habit may be of 

 some use in assembling and keeping flocks of them 

 together before and during migration. However, 

 the habit may have originated, it is now so deeply 

 ingrained in their nature that it seems to be im- 

 possible for the birds to begin or end the day without 

 indulging in it. When about to do so, they take up 

 a position on some projecting twig or prominent 

 point on the top of a shrub or low tree, and there 

 pour forth a torrent of rasping notes, while all the 

 time their tails are elevated and in constant motion, 

 waving about from side to side in a series of sweep- 

 ing curves, so that they seem to be actually rotated. 



Besides this chattering call they sometimes utter 

 another and very distinct one. This is of a loudly 



