38 SHRIKE. 



35— SILENT SHRIKE. 



La Pie-griesche silentieuse, Levail. Ois. ii. 103. pi. 74. 1. 2. 



Lanius silens, Shaw's Zool. vii. 330. 



SIZE of the Red-backed Shrike. Bill horn-coloured ; irides 

 brown ; top of the head, neck behind, back, wing coverts, and rump 

 black ; under parts of the body, from chin to vent, white, with a 

 longitudinal streak of the same on the wings, in the middle of the 

 quills; tail cuneiform, coloured as the back, but the side feathers 

 are white on the outer margins ; legs black. 



The female is smaller, the black tinged with brown, and the 

 white on the breast inclining to grey, otherwise one description may 

 serve. In some of these birds may be observed, in both sexes, a 

 tinge of rufous, or reddish at the angles of the mouth. 



Inhabits the forests of Hottniqua, along the Coast of Natal, and 

 all the interior parts of the Cape of Good Hope, but principally 

 those clothed with wood ; is called Silent, as it has not been heard 

 to utter any note. These birds begin to make a nest in November, 

 of a curious construction, placed on the slender branches of trees, 

 composed of a soft kind of cotton, taken from various plants, and 

 among others that kind of Mesembryanthemuin, called by the 

 Hottentots Kana Bossies ; lays three or four pale green eggs, clouded 

 with pale rufous; young birds of both sexes are at first like the 

 females. 



