Babbler. 

 Crateropus caiwrus. 



III. THE SEVEN SISTERS. 



" We are seven." Wordsworth. 



SOME years back, a new Viceroy was being shown 

 the wonders of his temporary kingdom, and among these 

 the Taj at Agra held, of course, an important place. Ar- 

 rived before the glorious monument of Eastern love and 

 pride, ' ' the artless Aide-de-Camp was mute ; the gilded 

 staff were still ' ' as Kipling says, in anxious expectation of 

 the comment of His Excellency. But this, alas i when it 

 came was merely the remark: "What are those funny 

 little birds ? ' ' The shock must have been the greater 

 for the fact that the mean fowls thus honoured were it 

 seems, of that singularly disreputable species which is 

 commonly known in India as the "Seven Sisters" or 

 "Seven Brothers," or by the Hindustani equivalent of 

 sat-bhai. In books it gets called the Jungle Babbler, the 



