564 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol X. 



(474) Anokkhinus AUSTENi.— Austen's Horn bill. 

 Hume, Cat., iVo. 144 Ter. 

 There is but one place in these hills where this bird may be met 

 with almost to a certainty, and this is the lower half of the Jetinga 

 Valley, In this valley a European bird-skinner of mine shot a bird 

 of this species, but the careless fool placed the skin on a low machan 

 during the night and the rats got at it and ate off the feet and also 

 part of one of the shoulders of the wings. This bird was one of a flock 

 of five, and the collector informed me cheerfully " Oh ! I didn't know 

 they were any good, or I should have shot all of them; they wouldrit 

 go away." Most probably, however, he was lying, as all I have seen of 

 this bird leads me to believe that they are the wildest of all this shy 

 family. I have often seen flocks and even more frequently heard of 

 them, but never yet have I got within shot, and the only other bird I 

 have ever handled was a female caught on her nest. This nest was 

 taken within half a mile of Gunjong, and the birds must therefore have 

 constantly been within sound of my bungalow had they been as noisy 

 as usual, but I never heard their unmistakable trumpet-like call, so that 

 I presume when breeding they discard their usual noisy habits. 



The nest was found quite by accident ; I was wandering up a small 

 nullah looking for a Forktail's nest, but came to the end of it without 

 having found anything ; at the top of this nullah was a grass-covered 

 hill and, as I came through the last bushes in it, I saw through the 

 twigs and branches a bird, which looked like a hornbill of some kind, 

 fly from the dead stump of a tree out in the open. Going up to this, 

 I soon spotted the hole, one some twenty feet up, and presently I saw the 

 hen-bird put out her bill for an inch or two. 



I could not however tell what kind of bird it was, or most assuredly 

 I would have waited long in the hopes of getting a shot at the male. 

 As it was, I sent the Nagar who was with me up the tree, and he, 

 breaking open the entrance, seized the bird and brought her down to 

 me, when, to my delight, I found that it was ^4. austini^ not as 

 I had expected a Common Pied Hornbill. Giving the bird 

 to me to hold, he then returned for the egg, on getting which, he took 

 charge of the bird and I took the egg. Would that I had never 

 changed, for no sooner did I do so than *' Ghajaiba," the Nagar, placed 

 his burden on the ground and went to fetch his dao, which weapon 



