4 THE BIRDS OF CALCUTTA. 



a house, and Mr. B. Aitken, in Hume's "Nests and 

 Eggs of Indian Birds," has given a long and amusing 

 account of an idiotic couple who wasted a whole breeding 

 season in trying to make nests in utterly impossible 

 positions in the verandah of the Madras Mail office ; other 

 eccentrics, wiser in their way. have built nests of wire, and 

 in one case even of gold and silver spectacle frames. I 

 have seen one bird which was vainly trying with its mate 

 to construct a nest in one of the little round windows of 

 the Economic and Art section of the Museum, soaking 

 twigs in water, for what reason I cannot divine, unless he 

 thought they would thereby become softer and stay in 

 position, which he was not at all successful in getting them 

 to do. The Crow evidently knows that water has a soften- 

 ing effect, for I have seen a bird come down to a tank with 

 a piece of bread in his bill, put it into the water to soak, 

 while he had a drink and then fly off with it. I have seen 

 jackdaws also in the London Zoo do a similar thing. It 

 is indeed curious to speculate on the extent of the Crow's 

 intelligence. Sometimes, when flying, you will see him 

 transfer something from his bill to his feet, and carry it 

 thus a .little way, as if he were trying to learn the kite's 

 trick of using his feet for transport. Yet he never seems 

 to learn to pick things off water with his feet, though pick- 

 ing objects up from that element at all is evidently an 

 acquired trick with him. I noticed our Crows about the 

 Museum are very poor hands at picking things off the tank, 

 while the Hooghly Crows were quite handy at water work. 

 Similarly, the Grand Hotel Crows are very good at catch- 

 ing flying, no doubt owing to constant feeding by residents 



