THE SHRIKE AND THE KING CROW. )$ 



makes a deep large cup-shaped nest in the thorniest 

 bush it can find, and lays four or five handsome, 

 spotted eggs. The usual season is from May to 

 August. 



Next come the Drongo Shrikes. A Drongo appears 

 to be connected on the father's side with the true 

 Shrikes and on the mother's with the Flycatchers. Or 

 it may be the other way : at any rate it has kinship 

 with both families. The King Crow is a Drongo. 

 It may seem to be superfluous to describe a King 

 Crow, but I have met persons who supposed that 

 it was some targe and royal sort of Crow, so I will 

 describe it. A King Crow (Dicrutus macrocercus, or 

 ater) is a shining black bird, not the size of a starling, 

 with a long, deeply forked tail, which perches on a 

 telegraph wire, or a dry twig, and makes sallies into 

 the sky after dragon flies or bees. It has nothing to 

 do with Crows, save to vex their lives. The occasion 

 for that is generally its nest, which it builds on some 

 outstanding branch of a conspicuous tree, scorning 

 concealment. Round this it establishes a " sphere 

 of influence/' and the Crow, being a notorious 

 poacher and damaged character, is forbidden to enter 

 that. But the Crow is always sounding the depths of 

 our patience with the plummet of insolence, and it 

 will try the experiment of flying lazily past the King 

 Crow's nest, or even alighting on a neighbouring 

 tree. Then the little bird gives a fierce, shrill scream, 

 and shoots out like an arrow from a bow. Its aim is 

 true and its beak is sharp and its target is the back 

 of the lawbreaker. The Crow is big enough to carry 

 off its puny enemy and pick its bones, if it could catch 

 it, but who can fight against a " bolt from the blue?" 



