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Dr. A. G. Butler,



lie is extremely combative and aggressive ; and reassumes the

sober protective dress immediately afterwards.


It is an amusing sight to watch the assurance with which

a male of Pyromelana oryx when in full colour will puff out all

its fiery orange feathers and dash at a bird of ten or twenty times

its own weight, driving it in terror from pillar to post: after its

moult, however, P. oryx is quite subdued ; or, if at times it struts

up to a bigger bird for a moment, the latter only has to stand its

ground and open its mouth to reduce it immediately to subjection.


Many instances of resemblance between powerful and

weakly birds have been recorded by Dr. A. R. Wallace; one of

the most curious perhaps being that of a Sparrow-hawk {Accipiter

pileatus) which, in Rio Janeiro assumes the plumage of a local

hawk (Harpagzcs diodoii) of insectivorous habits, with the advan¬

tage to itself of seeming harmless to the small birds upon which

it feeds, and thus approaching to within striking distance.


Numerous ground-frequenting birds are so coloured upon

the upper parts that they resemble the surrounding surface upon

which they walk, many of them however are most brilliantly

coloured on the under parts and seem to be aware of the danger

to themselves which would arise if this conspicuous colouring

were revealed to an enemy ; inasmuch as, at the slightest alarm,

they crouch down and do their utmost to conceal it.


A very good instance of this is to be seen in the Military

Starlings of South America with their black-streaked brown

upper parts, and mostly scarlet under parts. When alarmed they

crouch close to the ground with the breast and throat pitched

forward so as to conceal the scarlet as much as possible. Hudson

tells us that Defilippi’s Military Starling when migrating south¬

wards at the approach of the cold season moves over the ground

in a vast flock, consisting of from four or five hundred to a

thousand individuals, and suggests the idea of a disciplined army

on its march. One would have supposed that this would have

been the time when they would be most liable to the attacks of

birds of prey, but possibly they might unitedly attack an enemy,

and then their long bills attacking from all sides would scare

him away.


The Military Starlings appear to be extremely common



