272



On the White-bellied Amethyst Starling.



With me he hardly ever touched any fruit, in fact he seemed

quite content with the very uninteresting looking food-mixture,

his only preference being for the ants’ eggs, which he always

picked out first, but when they were finished he always cleared

up every scrap of the meal or the biscuit which formed the

basis of his food. He delighted in his bath, taking one whenever

he got the chance, and very soon became tame enough to take

an insect from the fingers, if it was one he liked; but his tastes-

in this line were distinctly delicate, as he would have nothing to

say to a grasshopper or other hard-skinned beast, but approved

of anything small, soft and squashy ; cockroaches, even babies,

the only sea-luxury available for bird-passengers, he would not

even look at, although he was all the time on rather short rations,

so that on board ship his diet was of the simplest, but simple as

it was it evidently agreed with him, as he arrived in perfect health

and practically perfect condition.


In Senegal and other parts of French West Africa the

native skin-hunters shoot a good many males for their skins, for

which they ask about a franc apiece, but I have never seen or

heard of one being caught alive by the professional native netters,

even by those who catch the ordinary Glossy Starlings. My

birds were both caught quite accidently and unexpectedly by

small boys who had set a few nooses for Weaver birds or doves in

the bush just outside their village. The birds’ irregular wander¬

ings and comparatively solitary habits are their safeguard, as the

native catcher generally sets his nets at water, or at any rate at a

place where he can catch numbers at a time ; he has no use for

birds which can only be caught “one-one,” as the expressive

language of the Coast has it. From Pholidauges point of view

may this long continue, though I must confess to hoping that

sooner or later I may have one or two more of the beauties to

bring home.



