xxx TAILS AND WINGS AS NUPTIAL LIVERY 



377 



territory. " Our common English blackbird is very 

 pugnacious in regard to trespassers along his hedge and 

 ditch. 



Sunbirds are very fond of the tree-lobelias. When 

 Count Teleki made an ascent of Kenia and had attained 

 an altitude of 11,600 feet the party was astonished at 

 the appearance of sunbirds (Nectarinia deckeni). A 

 nest with a chick in it was found and placed in front of 

 the tent and the male appeared " in all the beauty of 

 his bridal plumage. " 



One of the most conspicuous birds in the Rift Valley 

 is the bee-eater, and it is interesting to watch this bird 

 perched on the leafless bough of a tree from which it 

 makes short flights after bees, wasps, or insects which it 

 captures on the wing after the fashion of a fly-catcher, 

 and displaying its brilliant colours. The tail of this 

 bee-eater is peculiar, in many species the twelve rectrices 

 end squarely, but in Merops the two middle feathers 

 are prolonged far beyond the others, forming a median 

 tapering point. 



The bee-eaters are not shy birds, and will allow a 

 close approach, and they also pick ticks from the backs 

 of cattle. A. H. Neumann found bee-eaters numerous 

 around Lake Rudolf : indeed Merops nubicus was very 

 friendly with the large crested bustard of that region, 

 and had the habit of riding on the bustard's back. The 

 bustard did not " resent the liberty," but stalked majes- 

 tically along whilst its brilliantly clad little jockey kept 

 a look-out, sitting sideways, and now and again flew up 

 at an insect it had espied, returning again to its " camel," 

 as Juma the gunbearer not inaptly termed the bustard. 



The bee-eater also sat on the backs of goats, sheep 

 and antelopes, but the bustard was its favourite steed. 

 Neumann suggests, and probably rightly, that the 

 bee-eater found the back of the bustard a point of 

 vantage to see and pursue insects in a country where 

 suitable sticks to perch on are few. It was a common 

 sight to see bee-eaters mounted on bustards. On one 



