374 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



enjoyment from this form of recreation. The Flying Foxes 

 doubtless had a very different opinion ! 



In the way of recreation, I have often noticed the Simla 

 Crows (C. machrorhynchus) sailing about in wide circles high up 

 in the air, and occasionally in the evenings indulging in a game 

 which looks very like "I'm the King of the castle" on the 

 lightning conductors of the Imperial Secretariat Buildings. 



The common Kites (Milvus govinda), especially the young 

 birds, may often be seen playing with each other in the air. 

 One bird gets above the other, and then makes a swoop down- 

 wards, and is received by the lower one, which turns on its back 

 with its talons upwards, and so on, till both are lost in the azure 

 of the sky. 



The only case of abnormal instinct which has come under 

 my observation is that of one of my terrier bitches bring- 

 ing up a pup which had lost its mother. Before the pup 

 was brought into the house, the bitch showed no signs whatever 

 which would lead one to suppose that she would shortly become 

 a mother, and yet, after allowing the pup to suckle her, in a few 

 days she developed a copious supply of milk in all her teats. 



One of the most curious cases of aberrant instinct which I 

 have read about is that mentioned in Col. G. Marshall's 

 'Birds' Nesting in India' (Calcutta, 1877), on the authority of 

 Col. Tucker, R.E., the heroine this time being a Kite (Milvus 

 govinda) : — " Kites are not attractive birds, except for the 

 wonderful grace of their flight, and it is hard to imagine a 

 tender heart beneath their fierce but treacherous and withal 

 cowardly exteriors. In the month of January, in Lower Bengal, 

 when with the kites the breeding season is at its height, a 

 solitary female, over whom the instincts of the season evidently 

 had their sway, but who from some cause or other was unprovided 

 with a nest or eggs, appropriated an empty pill-box that had 

 been thrown on to the roof of a portico, and gathering some 

 sticks and straws round it in the corner of the roof to serve as a 

 nest, she commenced and carried on with admirable perseverance 

 a forlorn attempt to hatch it. When approached and driven 

 from her place, she would return to defend the beloved treasure, 

 dashing fiercely at the intruder. How long it would have taken 

 before her hopes of welcoming a young kite out of the pill -box 



