434 ZOOLOGY. 
lieve that the larger dragon-flies are very liable to the attacks of 
birds, and have no doubt that the hobby and kestrel occasionally 
feed upon them; with regard to the small blue-bodied species 
(Agrionide) frequenting the sedgy bank of the Thames, I have 
seen smaller birds, sparrows, etc., capture and eat them before my 
eyes, after having carefully nipped off the wings, which are not 
swallowed. This must take place to a considerable extent, as I 
have observed the tow-path strewn with the rejected wings.” This 
has been observed by Mr. J. L. Hersey of New Hampshire (see 
the following note) :— Eps. 
Bers AND Kinc-Birps.—For the last ten years I have carefully 
noted the habits and movements of the king-birds, and have come 
to the following conclusion, viz: that they do eat the honey bee, 
and so does the purple martin; but instead of being destroyed for 
it, they should be protected and allowed to build their nests near 
the farm-house, because they drive off the hawks, crows and other 
plundering birds from the poultry yard. Warm afternoons in July 
and August, when the drone bees are out, we have seen the martins 
come down within ten feet of the hive and snap up the drone bees, 
thus relieving the workers from the necessity of expelling them 
om the hive and biting off their wings to prevent them from 
getting back to the hive. The king-bird also, we find, selects the 
drone, and will come afternoons and take his position on a stake 
in front of the hive, and when a drone bee comes along will make 
a rush for him, come back to the stake, give him a pick or two and 
swallow him. But says an objector, ‘“ What do they subsist on 
before the drone bees fly out?” This point I settled by shooting 
one in the month of May, and I found in his crop the wings and 
legs of May-bugs. By watching their movements, I find the 
dragon-fly is also a favorite food for them.— J. L. Hersey, Ameri- 
can Bee Journal. 
Cotor or THE Eces or Caprimuncin=.—In the paper of Dr. 
Elliott Coues in the Naturauist of June, referring to the eggs of 
the Antrostomus Nuttallii, he speaks of it as a ‘singular circum- 
stance” that its eggs should be white and adds that it is “a thing 
before unknown in this genus.” In confirmation of his belief in 
the singularity of the absence of spots in the eggs of Nuttall’s 
whippoorwill Dr. Coues refers to Dr. Sclater’s generalization that 
all Caprimuigine lay colored eggs. 
