34 BRITISH BIRDS. 



buying up fleeces of sheep from the peasants. He told us that he had 

 travelled all the country round, and could assure us that there was not a 

 bird to be found of the kind we sought. He told us that last year the 

 birds swarmed in thousands in the valley below, and had built nests like 

 Blackbirds' in the clefts of the rocks and on the stony ground on the steep 

 hill-sides. That year (1 873) he said that they had arrived in great numbers, 

 but -at the expiration of a week had suddenly disappeared. A very inter- 

 esting account of the breeding of these birds in the same district sixteen 

 years previously is to be found in the 'Zoologist' for 1857, p. 5668, 

 translated from an article in ' Naumannia ' by the Marquis p. Antinori. 

 He and Mr. Gonzenbach did not discover the locality until the young had 

 left the nests. The birds arrived during the last week of May, and fresh 

 eggs must have been laid about the 10th of June ; but by the end of that 

 month the young had left the nest, and by the middle of July both 

 old and young had left the locality. The breeding-place was a rocky 

 mountain-side, and long before it was reached they noticed that every rock 

 and stone was covered with the white droppings of the birds. The nests 

 were in thousands, some quite open and uncovered, others so concealed 

 amongst the blocks of stone that it was necessary to turn the rocks over 

 to find them. Some were more than a foot below the surface, and others 

 beyond arm's length. The nests were often so close together as to touch 

 one another ; they were carelessly made of dry stalks and leaves, occa- 

 sionally lined with fine grass. Many eggs were laid on the bare ground. 

 The great number of birds naturally attracted many enemies; and the 

 remains of birds were lying about in all directions which had fallen a prey 

 to jackals, martens, wild cats, rats, &c. In these ravines the oleander is 

 very common ; and a small^flock of Rose-coloured Starlings often suddenly 

 becomes invisible as it drops on one of these shrubs, the pink backs and 

 breasts, of the Starlings being scarcely distinguishable from the pink 

 flowers of the oleander. During the breeding-season the females of the 

 Rose-coloured Starling sit very close and are assiduously fed by the males ; 

 and during the short time that the young are in the nest they are most 

 carefully tended by both parents. They are said to take pleasure in killing 

 locusts even when their appetites are satisfied. 



In the 'Zoologist' for 1878, p. 16, is a most interesting account of the 

 visit of these birds in 1875 to Villafranca, translated from the Italian of 

 Edoardo de Betta. About four o'clock in the afternoon of the 3rd of 

 June about a score Rose-coloured Starlings arrived at the castle, and 

 were followed in about half an hour by a much larger flock of perhaps a 

 hundred birds. Towards evening some thousands arrived, and at dusk 

 dispersed in flocks over the country. The next day the numbers increased 

 to about fourteen thousand ; and they soon ejected the Common Starlings 

 Swallows, Sparrows, and Pigeons from the holes in the battlements of the 



