532 



BRITISH BIRDS. 



the nest the old bird slowly took wing and flew round whilst one of our 

 party climbed up. 



The Black Stork does not always breed in trees. Hudleston found it 

 breeding in a cleft of the rocks in Bulgaria; and Elwes and Buckley 

 observed a pair making their nest in a low rock on the edge of the forest 

 in the north of the Dobrudscha. I/ Abbe David also says that in China 

 it breeds in perpendicular cliffs. 



The eggs of the Black Stork are from three to five in number, and dull 

 white in colour, coarse in texture, full of small pores, and with very little 

 gloss. They vary in length from 2'8 to 2'45 inch, and in breadth from 

 2'05 to 1*85 inch. On an average the eggs of this bird are smaller 

 than those of the White Stork, but large eggs of the former equal in 

 size small eggs of the latter. They vary considerably in shape, some 

 specimens being much rounder than others ; they are, however, readily 

 distinguished by the green colour of the inside of the shell when held up 

 to the light. 



The names applied to the two European Storks are unfortunate. The 

 White Stork is not white, neither is the Black Stork black ; but whereas 

 in the former species the wings below the shoulders are the only parts which 

 are black, in the latter the only white portions are the underparts below the 

 long neck-feathers. The rest of the plumage is, however, by no means 

 black; it is metallic blue, green, purple, violet, and almost red as the light 

 falls upon it in different directions. The bill, legs, and feet are deep scarlet, 

 as in the White Stork, but the bare space round the eye is deep scarlet 

 instead of black. The Black Stork is slightly the smaller bird. Young 

 in first plumage differ considerably from adults ; the metallic gloss on the 

 upper parts is much duller ; the feathers of the sides of the head and of the 

 neck, and some of the wing-coverts, have rusty white tips, and the bill, legs, 

 and feet are olive-brown. Birds of the year are intermediate in plumage. 



