348 COKONE MACEOEHYNCHA. 



but in the Nicobars it is only found iu Camorta and Trinkut, having been introduced into the former place 

 from Port Blair. 



From Burmali its range extends as far east as China and Eastern Siberia. Swinhoe notes it as being 

 found throughout the former, including Formosa and Hainan ; and, in its large form of C. japonensis, it inhabits 

 North China and Japan. The smaller Raven, designated Corvus culminatus by Sykcs, and kept distinct by 

 Mr. Sharpe, has been found at Yarkand. 



Habits. — This bold bird frequents native villages, some of the towns in Ceylon, pasture-lands, and other 

 situations in open country, as well as the wildest forest and jungle of the low country. It is usually found in 

 pairs, except when collected to feed on carrion, when large flocks come together.. They are constantly in 

 attendance on cattle and buffaloes, perching on their backs and feeding on the ticks which infest these animals. 

 In the interior it is very destructive to poultry and young chickens and is particularly partial to eggs. Several 

 pairs always take up their quarters during the breeding-season in the swamps and tanks where Herons and 

 Egrets biccd, and rob the nests right and left while the owners are absent. I have seen one drop into the 

 nest of a Purple Heron, turn over the eggs, aud selectiug one, adroitly carry it off in his bill, in less time than 

 it takes to write this. On two occasions I have known them to kill squirrels (Sciarus penicillatus) , in one of 

 which the marauder seized the animal by the tail and dashed it against the limb of a tree until it was killed ; 

 in the other, which I witnessed myself, my attention was attracted by the creature's cries, when I observed it to 

 be doubled up, in its agony, round the bird's bill, which had transfixed its stomach, the Crow holding it firmly, 

 without any apparent exertion. It is a bird of powerful flight, traversing wide tracts of country high in the 

 air, and frequently mounting to considerable altitudes in its pursuit of Hawks and Eagles. In its own turn it 

 is subject to the feeble but troublesome attacks of the " King-Crow" [Buchanga leucopygialis) . The "caw" 

 of this Crow is louder than that of C. splendem, but it has the power of modulating it and altering the tone 

 to an extraordinary extent. 



Jerdon speaks of it in India as eminently a carrion-crow, and often the first to discover a dead animal ; 

 while Mr. Ball writes of it as being a most useful guide to the sportsman as to the whereabouts of both dead 

 and living game, for, he says, " A tiger or a bear cannot walk about in the daylight without being made the 

 subject of some loudly-expressed remarks on the part of the Crows of the neighbourhood." 



I have myself observed this inquisitive tendency iu the Corby in Ceylon; and Layard remarks that though 

 a wounded deer may retire to the most tangled brake to die, its covert is invariably revealed to the hunter by 

 the Crows, who, congregating in small parties on the surrounding trees, patiently wait till life is extinct to 

 begin their repast with the jackals and wild hogs. 



Xit/ijica/ion. — The principal months for breeding are May, June, and July, most nests being built during 

 May. The nest is placed in the fork of a top bough, often so slender that it will not admit of the eggs 

 being safely reached ; or it may rest at the bases of cocoanut-fronds, entirely concealed from sight below. It 

 is a large structure of sticks and twigs, lined with fine roots, hair, wool, &c. The exterior is often very 

 straggling ; but the nest is very little larger on the whole than that of C. splendens. As remarked in a former 

 article, it is the favourite receptacle for the eggs of the Koel, containing sometimes as many as three or four 

 of them. The eggs are usually four in number, and much resemble those of C. splendens. They are long 

 ovals, and in many cases somewhat pyriforin, of a pale sea-green or light bluish-green ground, some being 

 thickly spotted with small specks of pale brown or umber-brown over the whole surface, mingled with linear 

 spots of the same; others have the markings much darker, larger, and more openly distributed. They vary, in 

 general, from 17 to 1"58 inch in length by 1*2 to 1*7 in breadth; but Mr. Hume records one specimen as 

 1 '.»."> in length, and says that in India they vary inter se surprisingly in size, in tone of colour, and in character 

 of marking, and that the birds of the plains lay slightly larger eggs than those of the Himalayas or Nilghiris, 

 the average of twenty of the former being P74 inch by 1*2 against 1*73 by 1*18 and 1'7 by 1 - 18 respectively. 



