404 TAXIDERMY AND MODELLING 



pocket. So he ascended, vowing at every step he could get no higher, 

 and proclaiming his, rooted objection to "such hard work as this." 

 At last, when quite near the nest, made nervous perhaps by the 

 thinness of the branches, he sang out, " I zay, zur, I can't go no furder, 

 this 'ere is too 'ard work for me." " Lucas," I shouted up, " you MUST, 

 and directly the nest reaches the ground, you shall have a sovereign." 

 At this juncture he touched his forehead with thanks, and I, fearing 

 for his safety, directed him to get above the nest, lie close to the 

 trunk, and cut off the branch on which the nest rested ; this he did by 

 means of the saw passed up to him by the string he carried. Some 

 time was occupied in sawing away lesser branches, until the main one 

 was attacked. As it cracked, two great birds nearly as large as the 

 parent ran out along the branches, and had to be brought to earth by 

 the rifle. At last the bough with the great nest swayed, broke oif, 

 turned over in the air, righted itself, and finally fell upright supported 

 by the underwood ; with it came the old bird, a magnificent and fully 

 adult male, with lengthy plumes and crests, together with the half of 

 a large eel, which he had brought to his young. Two balls had 

 passed right through the centre of his body, within two inches of each 

 cither, either of which would have been fatal. The nest— an enormous 

 structure, four feet across, and two feet thick, built of sticks, and after- 

 wards fiUing a cart — ^had not sustained the slightest injury, and was 

 not even jolted out of the forks in which it was built. Lucas came 

 down as he went up, assisted by the rope, and the getting of the nest, 

 from the time of the bird being' shot, occupied between four and five 

 hours. Needless to say, he had not a minute to wait for his well- 

 earned reward, and soon commenced to climb the tree from whence I 

 had shot the female, and, to my delight, procured from her nest four 

 small "chicks," which, by their charmingly-quaint hair-like crests and 

 downy plumage, to say nothing of their size, were in striking contrast 

 to the other two young birds. Soon after this we found an unbroken, 

 quite fresh, egg lying on the ground at the foot of a tree, deposited, 

 probably, by a gravid bird. 



Four more adult birds were brought down, and thus, firing 

 altogether nine rifle-shots, I bagged eight birds, five of which, viz. the 

 male and his two young, another male, and the female — with the 

 latter's four chicks, the two nests, the eel, and the egg — are in the 



