198 BIRD BEHAVIOUR 



The most fervent advocate of mimicry will 

 hardly maintain that small Doves and Passerines 

 and big waterfowl mimic Hawks ; so why not put 

 the whole thing down to coincidence ? The resem- 

 blance of our Cuckoo to a Hawk does not save it 

 from the real bird, for Mr. J. H. Owen in " British 

 Birds " for 1914 expressly mentions Cuckoos among 

 the victims of the Sparrow-Hawk. 



The Honey-guides, which are a family of very 

 few species, appear to be all parasitic, but practically 

 nothing is known about the ways of the Asiatic 

 species, not even the extraordinary and well-known 

 instinct of guiding men and the Ratel or Honey- 

 badger (Mellivora) to bee- nests being recorded of 

 them. The egg of the African Honey-guides, 

 which is white, has been found in the nest of the 

 White-throated Swallow (Hirundo albigularis) by 

 Mr. Ivy in the case of Sparrmann's Honey-guide 

 (Indicator sparrmanni) as recorded in Stark and 

 Sclater's " Birds of South Africa " ; the same 

 gentleman recorded the egg of the Yellow- throated 

 species (/. major) in the nest of a Drongo-shrike ; 

 while Mrs. Barber found the same species parasitizing 

 the Black-collared Barbet (Lybius torquatus). She 

 also found the Lesser Honey-guide (/. minor) 

 parasitizing the Tinker, another Barbet of very 

 small size (Barbatula pusilla). 



Mr. Ivy found a pair of the above-mentioned 

 Black-collared Barbet actually trying to fight off 

 this Honey-guide from their nesting-hole, the 

 intruder persistently returning ; evidently her case 



