324 Sir W. Jardine on the Habits of Prionites. 
great depth; but the aperture widens as it proceeds, espe- 
cially where there is a turning or angle, otherwise it would be 
impossible to save the two centre feathers of the tail; at the 
extremity it is widened to about two feet in diameter, where 
about the month of May, without the slightest preparation, 
they deposit three or four dusky cream-coloured eggs, about 
the size of those of a pigeon. | 
“‘ When the young have been hatched they remain in the 
nest until able to fly; they are supported by the parents, and 
are fed upon snakes, beetles, berries, &c., and in every nest 
which I have found there was below the young thousands of 
large maggots, bred and fed there 1 suppose by the nauseous 
fragments of insects left by the young birds. The young are 
easily tamed, and will eat mutton cut into small pieces, lizards, 
cock-roaches, &c. ‘The sun appears oppressive to them, and 
when driven out of doors they strove always to regain the 
house, where with unerring aim they would dart upon the 
smallest insect moving upon the ceiling. They are exceedingly 
acute in sight, nothing that moved passing their observation. 
They do not assist with the feet in destroying life, but will 
hold a snake of two or three feet long in their saw-like bill, 
and continue to strike him against the ground until life is ex- 
tinct, when they begin at one end and swallow him whole. I 
have also seen one with a very large lizard swallowed to the 
head and arms, which apparently could not be then got fur- 
ther.” 
In reply to some additional queries, our correspondent 
again writes on the 22nd of March: “The Prionites never 
catch their prey upon the wing like the Flycatchers; they 
frequent dark solitary groves, and are fond of being in the vi- 
cinity of marshy gullies or rivulets ; in such places I have often 
surprised them, sometimes singly and sometimes in pairs, with 
the bill and breast dirty as if they had been searching the 
earth for insects, the moist spots around bearing evident 
symptoms of having been so examined. When they seize a 
snake they never let go their hold, as if to renew it more se- 
curely, but turning the head to the right and to the left keep 
striking the snake sharply against the branch on which they 
are perched, for they, in a wild state, never remained on the 
ground a moment after 1 saw them catch their food. In 
speaking of the seizing of cock-roaches on the roof, I must be 
understood to refer to the young which I had domesticated ; 
and in such cases the cock-roaches were not flying, but were 
running along the ceiling; when seized, the Prionites invariabl 
alighted upon the floor, against which it would repeatedly 
strike the insect before swallowing. The domesticated Prionites 
