ABYSSINIAN HORNBIJ.L. 23 



scarabaeus or beetle. He has a putrid or stinking 

 smell, which, I suppose, is the reason he has been 

 imagined to feed upon carrion. The Erkoom builds 

 in large thick trees, always, if he can, near churches; 

 has a covered nest, like that of a Magpie, but four 

 times as large as an Eagle's: it places its nest firm 

 upon the trunk, without endeavouring to make it 

 high from the ground: the entry is always on the 

 East side." 



Mr. Bruce adds that this bird walks in the manner 

 of a Raven, and does not jump or hop in the manner 

 that many of the Crow kind do; that at times it runs 

 with very great velocity, and that in its running it 

 very much resembles the turkey or bustard when 

 his head is turned from the spectator. 



Mr. Latham describes the bill of this species as 

 measuring nine inches in length, slightly bent the 

 whole length, and compressed on the sides; both 

 mandibles channelled on the insides, and blunt at 

 the tips: on the top of the upper a protuberance 

 of a semicircular shape, two inches and a half in 

 diameter, and fifteen lines broad at the base, which 

 is over the eyes: this excrescence is of the same 

 substance with the bill, but so very thin as easily 

 to yield to the pressure of the fingers: the height 

 of the bill, with the appendix, measures vertically 

 almost three inches and three quarters. 



The young, according to Levaillant, are of a 

 brownish black colour, with the larger wing-fea- 

 thers rufous-white, and such seems to have been 

 the specimen described by Buffon. 



