CUCKOOS, TROGONS, TOUCANS. 



105 



metallic golden-cuckoos of Africa, Asia, and Australia, 

 no larger than sparrows, to the pheasant-like ground 

 cuckoo of Borneo, the Scythrops of the Moluccas which 

 almost resembles a hornbill, the Ehamphococcyx of 

 Celebes with its richly -coloured bill, and the Goliath 

 cuckoo of Gilolo with its enormously long and ample 

 tail. 



Cuckoos, being invariably weak and defenceless birds, 

 conceal themselves as much as possible among foliage 

 or herbage ; and as a further protection many of them 

 have acquired the coloration of rapacious or com- 

 bative birds. In several parts of the world cuckoos 

 are coloured exactly like hawks, while some of the 

 small Malayan cuckoos closely resemble the pugnacious 

 drongo-shrikes, 



Trogons, Barhets, and Toucans. — Many of the 

 families of Picarise are confined to the tropical forests, 

 and are remarkable for their varied and beautiful 

 colouring. Such are the trogons of America, Africa, 

 and Malaya, whose dense puffy plumage exhibits the 

 purest tints of rosy-pink, yellow, and white, set off by 

 black heads and a goldeurgreen or rich brown upper 

 surface. Of more slender forms, but hardly less brilliant 

 in colour, are the jacamars and motmots of America, with 

 the bee-eaters and rollers of the East, the latter ex- 

 hibiting tints of pale blue or verditor-green, which are 

 very unusual. The barbets are rather clumsy fruit-eating 

 birds, found in all the great tropical regions except 

 that of the Austro-Malay islands ; and they exhibit a 

 wonderful variety as well as strange combinations of 

 colours. Those of Asia and Malaya are mostly green, 

 but adorned about the head and neck with patches of 



