388 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XVII. 



Order — Passeres. — Family — Corvidse. — Mr. Fitzgerald told merecent- 

 Jy that lie had once seen the tree pie (Dendrocitta rufa), or as he called 

 it the " Bobbalink," killing a snake which probably from his description 

 was a Tropidonotus stolatus. 



Order — Auisodactyli. Sub-order— Coracise. — i have three records of 

 the common roller, or bine jay {Coracias indica), killing and eating these 

 reptiles. Grieves,* commenting on a paper on this bird which was 

 contributed by D. I)., says: " Cycling along a jnngle path one day my 

 attention was attracted to one of these birds which was making a great 

 fuss and noise close to the track along which I was to pass. I 

 dismounted, and was fortunate enough to see a great battle in 

 progress between a blue jay and a small cobra. The latter was 

 about 15 inches long, but it was certainly on its defence, and the 

 blue jay was the attacking party. The cobra was trying to get under 

 cover, but at every move the blue jay attacked it most ferociously, 

 apparently with both beak and claws. Then the cobra would rear 

 its head, expand its hood, and dart at the enemy. The blue jay did 

 not flinch, but at the same moment flicked out its wing horizontally, 

 and off the cobra started again, only to be teased, and tormented. I 

 had been watching this battle for fully five minutes when my dog, 

 which had been roaming about the jungle, rushed up to the spot, and 

 scared away the jay. The second incident occurred in my own com- 

 pound just a few weeks after the event referred to above. Out in 

 the compound one morning I saw a jay sitting on a low branch of 

 one of the trees struggling with something in its beak. On drawing 

 near I saw that the something was about 8 or 9 inches of snake. 

 The head had already disappeared, so that I cannot say how long the 

 snake might have been, or of what kind." 



On the 12th April last year (1905) Mr. Hose, the Deputy Com- 

 missioner in Fyzabad, told me he had that morning seen a roller in his 

 compound in the act of swallowing a small snake, and mentioned it as a 

 remarkable incident. 



Sub-order — Halcyones. — A writer to The Field (June 25th, 1904) 

 besides -mentioning two cats of his in Queensland that were in the habit 

 of killing snakes says : u But what surprised me still more was to see 

 the laughing jackass or great kingfisher of Australia carry a snake 



* « The Madras Mail," 17th September 1904. 



