I So THE INDUSTRIES OF ANIMALS. 



possess a dwelling on two neighbouring trees, the 

 principle of conjugal cohabitation not being admitted 

 in this species. As to the child, it appears that it 

 sleeps near its mother, until it is of age to lead an 

 independent life. 



There exists in Australia, the country of zoological 

 singularities, a bird with very curious customs. This 

 is the Satin Bower-bird. The art displayed in this 

 bird's constructions is not less interesting than the 

 sociability he gives evidence of, and his desire to 

 have for his hours of leisure a shelter adorned to his 

 taste. The bowers which he constructs, and which 

 present on a small scale the appearance of the arbours 

 in our old gardens, are places for re-union and for 

 warbling and courtship, in which the birds stay during 

 the day, when no anxiety leads them to disperse. 

 They are not, properly speaking, nests built for the 

 purpose of rearing young ; for at the epoch of love 

 each couple separates and constructs a special retreat 

 in the neighbourhood of the bower. These shelters 

 are always situated in the most retired parts of the 

 forest, and are placed on the earth at the foot of trees. 

 Several couples work together to raise the edifice, the 

 males performing the chief part of the work. At first 

 they establish a slightly convex floor, made with 

 interlaced sticks, intended to keep the place sheltered 

 from the moisture of the soil. The arbour rises in 

 the centre of this first platform. Boughs vertically 

 arranged are interlaced at the base with those of the 

 floor. The birds arrange them in two rows facing 

 each other ; they then curve together the upper 

 extremities of these sticks, and fix them so as to 

 obtain a vault. All the prominences in the materials 

 employed are turned towards the outside, so that the 



