304 HERONS, STORKS, AND IBISES. 
it may be found either singly, in pairs, or in small companies. It always frequents 
regions the most remote from human habitations, where it may be seen standing— 
sometimes breast-deep—in the water by the side of some tall papyrus stem, and 
frequently resting on one leg only. But seldom is this bird seen away from the 
neighbourhood of tall reeds, although it sometimes takes its station on a white-ant 
hill on the bank, and occasionally resorts to open reaches of the river. When first 
disturbed by a boat, it will fly off slowly above the reeds with a great noise, and 
again settle; but if roused a second time, it rises high into the air, and will not 
again return to its haunt until the danger is past. Its flight is not unlike that of 
the marabou stork, but the heavy beak is generally kept resting on the crop. The 
only sound it utters is aloud snapping of the beak, in which respect it resembles 
the storks. Its principal food is fish, in order to capture which the bird often 
stands breast-deep in the stream with its enormous beak lowered to the surface of 
the water; while at other times several individuals will combine to drive the fish 
towards the shallows by marching in a semicircle through the water, and making a 
great flapping of their wings. It has been asserted that these storks will kill and 
eat snakes; but it is probable that the statement has arisen from their devouring 
the fish known as the bisher (Polypterus), which the natives sometimes term a 
water-snake. That dead carcases and carrion are also consumed appears to be well 
ascertained. The breeding-season takes place during the rains; the nest being 
situated on some slight elevation among the reeds, especially one surrounded on all 
sides by water. Here the birds collect a vast quantity of stalks and water-plants, 
often soliditied with mud, so as to form an accumulation of about a yard in height. 
The eggs, which are small in proportion to the size of the bird, have thick white 
shells, which are, however, bluish when first laid, but become brownish as incuba- 
tion progresses; they are overlain with a chalky coating. Young taken from the 
nest thrive well on a fish diet, and are easily tamed. 
THE HAMMER-HEAD. 
Family SCOPID2£. 
From a structural point of view the small brown African bird, known as the 
hammer-head or umbre (Scopus wiibrella), is even more remarkable than the pre- 
ceding, since it combines many features common to the herons and storks, and is 
accordingly regarded by Mr. Beddard as nearly allied to the common ancestral 
stork from which those two groups have sprung. It differs from the herons in the 
absence of powder-down patches on the rump, and of pectination in the claw of 
the third toe, as well as in having the angle of the furcula without any median 
projection; but it resembles them in having the rings of the bronchial tubes 
incomplete behind, and closed with membrane. In some other parts of its internal 
anatomy it agrees with the herons on the one hand and the storks on the other; 
but it differs from all herons except the boat-billed species in the shortness of its 
triangular tongue, and thereby resembles the whale-head and the storks, while it 
is peculiar in having large bare tracts on the sides of the neck. The hammer- 
head measures about 25 inches in total length, and has a somewhat cylindrical 
