THE SEVEN SISTERS 205 



It may be likened to the human being who refuses 

 to recognize the use of a hair-brush, who persists in 

 wearing dirzie-ma.de clothes, although his friends warn 

 him that he will one day be mistaken for a scarecrow, 

 and who, as often as not, forgets to put on a necktie. 



This babbler has, further, a voice which is a very fair 

 imitation of the sound produced by a rusty axle in 

 motion. Passing upwards, through a host of inter- 

 mediate species, we come to another landmark, in the 

 shape of Malacocercus somervillei^ the common Bombay 

 babbler, which, as "Eha" describes, "reminds you of 

 old Jones who spends the day in his pyjamas." Even- 

 tually we ascend to the Madras babbler, Malacocercus 

 griseus, which must be considered as the " toff" of the 

 babbler brotherhood. 



This bird is so well known, being found in numbers 

 in every garden in South India, that all description is 

 superfluous. No one but a blind man can help remark- 

 ing the chattering greyish-brown birds with yellowish 

 white heads which abound in Madras. The first ones 

 I saw introduced themselves to me as I was driving 

 out of the railway-station yard, three minutes after my 

 arrival. 



Some of these babblers are more hoary than others. 

 I think that the older birds exhibit the whitest heads. 

 The white on the head of the babbler fledgling is 

 certainly not conspicuous. Babblers differ from all 

 other birds in that the unit of the community is not 

 the individual, nor even the family, but the Club. 



Babbler society is made up of a number of little Clubs, 

 each composed of from seven to a dozen members ; 



