Chap. XIII. Love Antics and Decoration. 3S1 



" saltatory summons/' and when they approach he trails his 

 wings and spreads his tail like a turkey-cock.™ 



But the most curious case is afforded by three allied genera ol 

 Australian birds, the famous Bower-birds, — no doubt the co- 

 descendants of some ancient species which first acquired the 

 strange instinct of constructing bowers for performing their 

 love-antics. The bowers (fig. 4tj), which, as we shall hereafter 

 see, are decorated with feathers, shells, bones, and leaves, ase 

 built on the ground for the sole purpose of coiirtship, for their 

 uests are formed in trees. Both sexes assist in the erection of 

 the bowers, but the male is the principal workman. So strong 

 is this instinct that it is practised under confinement, and Mr 

 Strange has described "" the habits of some Satin Bower-birds 

 which he kept in an aviary in New Snuth Wales. " At times 

 " the male will chase the female all over the aviary, then go to 

 " the bower, pick up a gay feather or a large leaf, utter a curious 

 " kind of note, set all his feathers erect, run round the bower and 

 " become so excited that his eyes appear ready to start from his 

 " head; he continues opening first one wing then the other, 

 " uttering a low, whistling note, and, like the domestic cock, 

 " seems to be picking up something from the ground until at 

 " last the female goeg gently towards him." Captain Stokes has 

 described the habits and " play-houses " of another species, the 

 Great Bower-bird, which was seen " amusing itself by flying 

 " backwards and forwards, taking a shell alternately from eacli 

 " side, and carrying it through the archway in its mouth." 

 These curious structures, formed solely as halls of assemblage, 

 where both sexes amuse themselves and pay their court, must 

 cost the birds much labour. The bower, for instance, of the 

 Fawn-breasted species, is nearly four feet in length, eighteen 

 inches in height, and is raised on a thick platform of sticks. 



Decm-ation. — 1 will first discuss the cases in which the males 

 are ornamented either exclusively or in a much higher degree 

 than the females, and in a succeeding chapter those in which 

 both sexes are equally ornamented, and finally the rare cases in 

 which the female is somewhat more brightly-coloured than tlio 



*' For Tetrao phasianellus, see the Indian Bustard, Jerdon, * Bir Is 



liicharJson, ' Fauna, Bor. America,' of India,' vol. iii. p. 618. 

 p. 361, and for further particulars ^^ Gould, ' Handbook to the Birds 



Capt. Blakiston, ' Ibis,' 1863, p. 125. of Australia,' vol. i. pp. 444, 449, 



For the Cathartes and Ardea, Au- 455. The bower of the Satin 



dubon, ' Ornith. Biography,' vol. ii. Bower -bird may he seen in th« 



p. 51, and vol. iii. p. 89. On the Zoological Society's Gardens, &e< 



White-throat, Macgillivray, ' Hist, gunt's Park. 

 British Birds,' vol ii. p. 354. On 



