322 NATIVE BIED-NESTING. 



the brushes, where the g"lancing" of its brig-ht colours 

 as it darts past in rapid flig'ht arrests the attention 

 for a moment ere it is lost among' the dense foliag'e. 

 I may next allude to Aplonis metallica — a bird 

 somewhat resembling' a starling', of a dark glossy 

 green and purple hue, with metaUic reflections — in 

 connection with its singular nest. One day I was 

 taken by a native to the centre of a brush, where a 

 gigantic cotton tree standing alone was himg with 

 about fifty of the large pensile nests of this species. 

 After I had made several unsuccessful attempts to 

 shoot down one of the nests by firing with ball at 

 the supporting branch, the black volunteered to 

 climb the tree, provided I would give him a knife. 

 I was puzzled to know how he proposed to act, 

 the trunk being upwards of four feet in diameter 

 at the base, and the nearest branch being about 

 sixty feet fi-om the ground. He procured a tough 

 and phant shoot of a kind of vine [Cissus), of 

 sufficient length to pass nearly round the tree, and 

 holding one end of this in each hand and pressing his 

 legs and feet against the tree, he ascended by a series 

 of jerks, resting occasionally, holding on for half a 

 minute at a time with one end of the vine in his 

 mouth. At length he reached the branches and 

 threw me down as many nests as I required. He 

 afterwards filled the bag which he carried round 

 his neck with the unfledged young birds, which 

 on our return to the native camp on the beach were 

 thrown alive upon the fire, in spite of my remon- 



Digitized by Microsoft® 



