98 
POPULAU HISTORY OF BIRDS. 
its cry before rain resembling those words repeated. The 
lora feeds on insects, spiders, and grubs. 
Dr. Horsfield describes the lora scapularis of Java as a 
bird of social habits, which resorts to the vicinity of human 
dwellings ; indeed so much so, that it appears to have re- 
tired from the forests, and established itself in the trees and 
hedges which surround the villages and plantations."'^ There 
it may be seen, flying from branch to branch; it is most 
active in the middle of the day, when the heat of the sun is 
greatest, and the inhabitants uniformly retire to rest. Its 
enlivening song may then be heard, during the silence of 
noon, as it sports between the branches. Its food consists of 
small insects, which it finds often on and in the bark of trees'^. 
There is no accounting for taste in either men or birds; 
although the great mass of the soft-billed birds build their 
nests in trees, there are others that abjure such situations. 
One of these, the Solitary Rock Warbler of New South 
Wales [Origma mhricata), suspends its nest to the ceilings 
of caverns, and the under surface of overhanging rocks. 
Mr. Gould observed this bird frequently in Australia, and 
found that this was its invariable habit. This nest is of an 
oblong globular form, and is formed of moss and such like 
* Dr. Horsfield. Zoological Researches in Java. 
