324 Timehri. 



with white. It has the appearance of wearing a cap push back from the 

 forehead, aDcl a black cloak slipped over the shoulders. It is known 

 scientifically as the Black-and-White Tyrant Bird (Fluvicola pica) ; but 

 there is nothing tyrannical about its nature. It is one of those birds 

 which from its habits and environment has acquired the peculiarities of 

 a bird of another order. It has, in fact, the habits of our Water 

 Wag-tail, and even goes so far as to jerk its caudal appendage ; but as 

 this is short its efforts to imitate its prototype are more ridiculous than 

 graceful. It is truly fluvicola, a river-dweller, but it is not pica, that is, 

 "a bird that pecks its food from the bark of a tree." It is never found 

 far away from water, feeding as it does upon the flies and other insects 

 that gather about that element. It builds its nest upon some low bush 

 or stunted tree, if it should find one fairly inaccessible to its enemies ; 

 failing that, it will not hesitate to build its homestead high. 



I once had a nest of young ones ; little animated balls of cotton. 

 They were coming on nicely until one night (I was in the North West 

 District) they succumbed to the cold. 



The Cotton-bird has neither high bird-intelligence, nor tuneful 

 voice, nor yet splendid plumage to recommend it as a cage-bird. The 

 only note I have heard it utter is a modest tweet-tweet ; and this not 

 very often. 



The Rustic Tyrant-Bird. 

 Another bird that is no tyrant though it bears the name is Eleinea 

 pagana, vulgarly called the Muff P3ird. which in creole language means 

 " a bird with a crest." How the word muff in this colony has come to 

 mean a crest passes my comprehension. 



The name Eleinea, that is (Greek) "belonging to the olive tree," is 

 given to the bird, I suppose, on account of its sober colour of drib. If 

 by some magic art an olive-tree could be changed into a bird, this might 

 well be that denouement. Its tail would represent the trunk of that 

 tree ; the olive-grey feathers, the leaves ; the yellow markings the young 

 shoots, and so on But I must describe the bird itself. 



Six inches in extreme length, of which the tail is nearly two, the bird 

 is a dull, homely, olive-grey above and light olive, fading into yellowish 

 grey, below. There are two bars of yellow-olive upon the wings, the 

 two lines of upper wing coverts being tipped with this colour ; the outer 

 edges of the primaries are also of the same colour ; the vent feathers are 

 yellowish-green ; the under-wing coverts are also light yellow. The 

 bird has a conical crest which is generally kept erect. Its note is like 



a low-toned policeman's whistle, wlv.e ah. The mated pairs have a 



habit, common to kiskadees and some other tyrant birds, of taking a 

 short flight together and then alighting, of saluting each other with 

 shaking wings ; and whereas the kiskadee utters his own name several 

 times, little •pagana seems to say, " Wre — wre — wre, look at me, look at 

 me, look at me ! " 



