NOTES FROM NATAL. 257 



observed in the winter months, but Butler obtained a male on the 

 10th June there, and shot a couple of specimens in some bush near 

 Lady smith on the 21st August ; so they do not, apparently, leave 

 the colony at all. About Newcastle they were first noticed in 

 numbers about the middle of October, when they at once 

 proceeded to the construction of their nests. These we found in 

 tall trees, on bushes overhanging steep krantzes, as well as in 

 bushes and reeds by the river-side. Over thirty nests were 

 counted on one tree. The male appears to do most of the build- 

 ing, but this may be only a supposition, arising from the much 

 greater shyness of the female while an intruder is near. The 

 first eggs were taken on the 29th October. How they can pos- 

 sibly remain in the nest when a gale of wind is blowing is quite a 

 mystery, the entrance being so large and the depression inside 

 the globular portion so little below it. " Apparently not so 

 numerous down country as H. velatus, which seems almost to 

 replace it at Ladysmith, Colenso, and Blaauw Krantz, but a 

 colony were breeding on an island in Mooi River, at Weston, in 

 November, and it was also nesting, in small numbers, at Rich- 

 mond Road, in December " (R). Butler mentions that the nest 

 is shaped like a snail's shell, with the entrance directed down- 

 wards, and that out of some dozens of nests examined, containing 

 eggs in all stages of incubation, he failed to discover more than 

 three eggs, many containing only tivo. " The male only assumes 

 the bright yellow plumage in the breeding season ; at other times 

 he closely resembles the female, but is greener above and more 

 yellow below" (B). " Legs and feet brownish flesh ; bill blackish; 

 iris brownish-white, in some greyish brown and dark brown. The 

 crop of one examined was full of caterpillars " (B). 



Hyphantornis velatus (Viel.), Black-fronted Weaver Bird. — 

 Seen in September in small reedy vleys between Newcastle and 

 the Drakensberg. Butler obtained specimens there, and found 

 one or two nests, but these were afterwards knocked down 

 by a hailstorm. Not observed elsewhere (though doubtless 

 occurring in suitable places) in the Newcastle district, but we 

 found it very common, and came across many colonies, nesting at 

 most of the halting- places on the march down country, notably 

 near Ladysmith, Colenso, and the Blaauw Krautz River. The 

 eggs are most variable in colouring, as mentioned by Layard. 

 Like H. capensis, the birds are very shy and difficult to get near, 



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