THE BIRDS OF SINGAPORE ISLAND 
[One of the sights which always attracts the notice of 
those who arrive for the first time in Singapore by sea is the 
crowd of kites flying and squealing in the harbour and pouncing 
on garbage and odds and ends of food thrown overboard from 
the ships. This ubiquitous bird is the Malayan brahminy kite — 
the Burong Lang merah of the Malays™, a powerftil flier and 
rapacious feeder. It will pick small fish from the surface of 
the water or young chickens from the poultry yard: frogs, 
crabs, lizards, shell-fish and even locusts are often eaten by it 
but in the neighbourhood of towns it is content to exist on 
offal and carrion and is really rather a useful scavenger. Its 
nest placed in high trees is a fairly compact structure of twigs 
and sticks and it lays two eggs of a white ground colour 
splotched with rusty brown, St. Johns Island near Singapore 
is a well-known breeding haunt. It seems always in the air 
and though usually a lazy-looking mover^ — remigio alantm — m 
the breeding season or when frightened it displays extra- 
ordinary agility, — J, A. S. B.], 
[IQO] 
