BIRDS IN SINGAPORE. 75 
easy prey to the hawk. When one of these hawks settles in 
a tree it is immediately surrounded bya crowd of small birds, 
who chatter at it, although as a rule they do not take any 
notice of the other hawks previously mentioned. 
A much rarer visitor is the charming little black and white 
hawk Buza lophotes. Indeed I have only once seen it in the 
gardens. It is about as big as a kestrel, with the head, neck, 
and wings black, with a white bar on the latter; the breast is 
white, and the belly white barred with brown, the tail black 
above and grey beneath. 
The Brahminy kite (Haliastur indus), so common and 
conspicuous in the harbour, may often be seen. I have seen as 
many as five at once in the garden. I believe it nests in large 
trees near Tyersall, as young birds were seen and caught in 
and round the gardens, but I never found the nest. The young 
are dull brown in colour, and only the adults have the red wings 
and white head which makes them so ornamental. It lives very 
well in confinement. 
One evening a cooly found in the gardens two small white 
hawk-eagles (Nizaetus pennatus), fighting furiously on the 
eround. ‘Throwing his coat on them he caught one and bore it 
off to the aviary. By amistake it was put intoacage with a large 
sea-eagle, but all went well till the birds were fed, when the small 
eagle disregarding its own piece of meat attacked the sea-eagle 
and attempted to rob it of its portion. The latter being much the 
bigger and stronger bird, caught the assailant by its wings 
in its claws and held it fast. The little eagle was quickly 
rescued and transferred to another cage where, though 
somewhat ruffled, it seemed quite at ease, and sat on its 
perch elevating its crest like a cockatoo. Next day, however, 
immediately after eating its meat it fell dead off its perch. 
A postmortem examination disclosed that the liver was exten- 
sively lacerated and other internal organs much torn. This 
must have been done in the first fight, as the sea-eagle never 
touched its body with its claws at all. It was wonderful 
that the bird showed such pugnacity after such severe injury. 
The Asiatic sparrow-hawk (Accipiter virgatus), a little 
bird very closely resembling the English sparrow-hawk, is 
very common. 1 have watched it chasing a starling round 
and round the trees for some time, and have seen one dart on 
