THE COMMON HOOPOE. 109 



soaked in milk : they then live four years, and sometimes 

 longer. It is to be regretted that the confined male birds never 

 retain their beautiful black and yellow plumage, but become 

 and remain, like the females. 



Attractive Qualities. I have seen two young males, which 

 had been reared from the nest, that besides the natural song, 

 like hidahaya, goigaia, whistled, one a nourish of trumpets, 

 and the other a minuet. The round, full, flute-like tone, 

 rendered their song exceedingly pleasing. Their yellow plum- 

 age was unfortunately tarnished, which frequently happens if 

 they are kept in a room where there is tobacco, or any other 

 smoke. Their call, by which they are so easily recognizable in 

 June, is Yo, or PuTilo. 



ADDITIONAL. " The Orioles," says MACGILLIVBAY, "appear to 

 be allied to the Boilers ; not only the form of their bill, but also their 

 short tarsi and broad toes indicating this affinity. They belong 

 to Africa, and the warmer parts of Asia and New Holland. One 

 species appears in England as an occasional or accidental visitor," 

 and this is the bird here described by BECHSTEIN so fully, that 

 little fresh information can be added to it. YAEEELL gives an 

 account of the several specimens which have been shot in this 

 country, or are to be found in the various public or private col- 

 lections of stuffed birds ; he also describes the nest of the bird as 

 rather flat and saucer-shaped, generally placed on the horizontal 

 fork of a bough of a tree, to both branches of which it is firmly 

 attached. The materials used to form the nest are sheeps' wool 

 and long slender stems of grass, so curiously interwoven as mu- 

 tually to confine and sustain each other." ME. MEYEE, in his 

 Illustrations of British Birds, gives a representation of one of 

 these nests taken in Suffolk ; another collector is said to have 

 had eggs of the Golden Oriole, which were taken in the county 

 of Norfolk, by which it would seem that the bird does occa- 

 sionally breed in this country. 



The Spaniards term this bird Turiol, the French Loriot, the 

 English Oriole, names which are said to have originated in the 

 sound of its call-note, which they are supposed to resemble. 



18. THE COMMON HOOPOE. 

 Upupa Epops, LIN. Hupe, ou Pupet, BUF. Der Gemeine wiedehopf, BECH. 



Description. This bird, about the size of a Missel-thrush, 

 is one foot in length, of which the tail measures four inches. 

 The beak is two inches and a half long ; black, thin, and 



