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early morning they remain where they have roosted, utter their call-note in a low tone, and 

 about nine o'clock collect in flocks and spread over the fields and in the villages, uttering loud 

 cries. Their flight is Swallow-like but irregular, and one or two leave the flock and circle round 

 catching insects, which are devoured either on the wing or when seated on a branch at the top 

 of a tree. During the heat in the middle of the day they rest for a time ; and I never saw a Bee- 

 eater go to drink. In the evening they collect together and, uttering their note noisily, go to 

 roost. In the summer they are very fat, and numbers are killed and eaten by the Italian and 

 Greek gunners. Late in August one meets flocks of this Bee-eater on passage in Nubia, East 

 Sudan, and Abyssinia ; but they do not winter here, but migrate further in a southerly or south- 

 westerly direction. On the 17th October, 1857, I found the Avicennia-ihickets on some of the 

 islands on the Somali coast covered with Bee-eaters and Rollers, which evidently came there after 

 the flocks of locusts. Brehm surmised correctly that this species breeds in May in Central and 

 Lower Egypt ; for I shot a female at New Dongolah on the 19th May which had a fully formed 

 egg in the ovary. Allen found a colony breeding at Damietta in April ; and I also found one on 

 some half-desert pasture-land at Dachschur in the same month. But Brehm is wrong in saying 

 that all Bee-eaters (and he probably means M. apiaster in particular) migrate solely in company 

 with M. persicus ; for one finds separate flocks of the different species in the same locality, but 

 I never saw them intermixed. Hartmann states that he observed Merops persicus in January 

 near Golosaneh, in Egypt, whereas I never saw it between September and March in North-east 

 Africa. In the autumn the plumage fades greatly and loses the rich green sheen ; and the moult 

 probably takes place in January and February." 



It is found in North-western Africa, and has been observed in Algeria, though it seems to 

 be somewhat rare there. Mr. J. H. Gurney, jun., writes (Ibis, 1871, p. 75) as follows: — "On 

 the 21st of April I saw an Egyptian Bee-eater in one of the cemeteries of Gardaia, which proved 

 to be of this species. I afterwards came upon a flock of them lying upon the large stones which 

 are scattered about wherever there are no gardens. I saw them also on the walls, and on the 

 fence-work upon the town wall ; and returning I found the cemetery, where I had seen the first 

 solitary bird, occupied by about a dozen. They were perfectly tame ; and I thought I had never 

 seen a more interesting sight than these sparkling birds as, one after the other, they rose into 

 the air to hawk for insects, and, returning, perched upon a tombstone within a few yards, 

 perhaps, of where I was standing. They have only one note; it is loud and rather harsh, like 

 the common Bee-eater's. Their flight is slower, but even more gliding, with the wings very 

 much raised, except when the birds are high in air, when they hold their wings more depressed. 

 They almost lie upon stones and walls, as if unable to sit upright on account of their long tails 

 and short legs." 



It is found all along the west coast of Africa. Swainson records it from Senegambia ; and 

 examples from Senegal are in the Leyden Museum. Verreaux records it from Casamanze, 

 Bissao, and the Gaboon; Monteiro from Benguela and Angola; specimens are in the Lisbon 

 Museum from Loanda and Rio Quilo, in Angola; and I possess examples from Bissao, the 

 Gambia, and Ondonga — that from this last locality collected by Mr. Andersson, who observed 

 it near the Okavango river; and in his last collection he sent several specimens, obtained in 

 Ondonga in November 1866. It is found also in the Cape colony. Mr. E. L. Layard writes 



