All rights reserved.'] March, 1909. 
BIRD NOTES: 
■ THE 
JOURNAL OF THE FOREIGN BIRD CLUB. 
ZTbe (Biant iBarbet. 
{Megalcema viretis). 
By S. M. TowNSEND. 
In December (1907) I heard that one of the dealers had two 
rare Barbets, and as I have always been rather partial to these 
birds, I went to see them. I cannot say I was particularly struck 
with them : they were in two small Parrot cages, which had only one 
perch in them, in fact, so caged that it would hardly have given 
any bird a chance of looking well, much less a large bird like the 
Giant Barbet. I came away without purchasing either of them, 
and I think I visited the sliop two or three times before I made 
up my mind to buy one. At last, however, I picked out the one 
that I thought to be the best and brought him home. I was 
much struck when I had got him home and put him into a larger 
cage by the funny way he had of wagging his tail. It was a 
diflferent movement to anything I have ever seen a bird do ; he 
wagged it when spoken to from side to side, just the same as a 
dog does, but with a jerky, mechanical movement. 
The first difficulty was, would he eat the food I give to my 
other birds; he soon decided that for me by simply ignoring it. 
I next tried the food I use for the Toucans, not ground fine as 
the other is, but in lumps about the size of a small nut ; he ate 
that a little, but not enough to satisfy me, as he is a large bird 
and I had heard such a lot about his appetite. Of course he was 
having fruit every day, two bananas, but after a little time he 
seemed to take a dislike to these, so I tried him witli boiled rice 
and currants, but he soon tired of this and used only to throw it 
about ; and .so he goes on, he seems continually to want a change. 
Last autumn I got some haw berries, he ate a few, but was not at 
all keen about them. Soon after I bought him I gave him a dead 
