MALAYAN ORNITHOLOGY. iid inl: 
I found the oil-jar plan to answer best; but as sure as a straw. 
or even dust in any quantity, blew into the oil, so surely would 
the ants at once find out the bridge, cross it in myriads, and in a 
few minutes one’s cherished skins were a moving mass of these 
pests. 
_ I have known them attack in thousands, and even eat holes in 
the skin of, a sickly bird in my aviary some time before it was 
actually dead; and in this way, among other specimens, I lost my 
only one of that curious pheasant-like bird, Rhizothera longirostris 
(Temm.). 
The peninsula, more particularly its western half, is now being 
extensively worked by ornithologists from India; so, before very 
long, doubtless, its birds and their habits will be much better 
known than they are at present. 
Oroayps caLvus (Scop.). 
Early in February, 1877, near Kwala Kangsa, on the Perak 
river, I came across one of these Vultures in company with sev- 
eral of the common brown species—Pseudogyps bengalensis. They 
were all busily engaged feeding on the decaying carcase of a buffalo, 
but rose at my approach; and this bird flew so close over head 
that a charge of snipe-shot brought it flapping to the ground. Erx- 
cept on this occasion, I never met with O. calvus; nor did I see ° 
any specimens in the Malacca or Singapore collections. My bird 
was an adult, of such dark plumage as, ata short distance, to look 
quite black; legs, bare skin of head and neck pinky red, irides 
yellow. 
PSEUDOGYPS BENGALENSIS (Gm.). 
The common Vulture of the country, collecting in the most 
marvellcus manner wherever there is carrion. 
One evening in Pérak T lay concealed at the edge of the thick 
jungle, and watched for a long time a crowd of these scavengers 
squabbling over a dead buffalo, which had died on some open 
ground within 50 yards of where I was. They became so gorged 
that, on my coming out of the bushes, it was with difficulty they 
took to wing, then flying but a short distance and squatting in 
rows along the upper branches of a large dead tree, from which 
I picked off three of their number with my pea-rifle. 
