202 
Pleasures of Aviculture. 
interest is the quivering motion of the racquet-hke caudal 
plumes while the bird is in flight and immediately on ahghting. 
A thing of " beauty and a joy for ever ' ' while in full 
colour is my Napoleon Weaver, a bird which was bred in my 
Mitcham aviary in 1913. As I watched him, for some time he 
sat in repose on a branch of a privet bush, with only his head 
visible, his other parts being screened by the foliage, looking 
very like a brilliant yellow flower till a sudden movement 
betrayed his identity — -then his inertness suddenly ceases and he 
puffs out his feathers and pours out his heart in Napoleonic 
weaver's song — thus thoroughly awaked, he sets to, to repair, 
or add to, one of the many nests with which he has adorned the 
aviary. 
Another lovely 
bird of the Weaver- 
tribe is my Speke's 
Weaver, a lovely bird 
about the size of the 
well-known Rufous- 
necked Weaver and a 
member of the same gen- 
us, but much more bril- 
the 
has 
has 
his 
clad — during 
liantly 
six years the bird 
been with me he 
spent the whole of 
time out of doors, win- 
ter and summer alike, 
and has always appeared 
vigorous, alert, and ap- 
parently quite happy, 
whatever the weather 
conditions are. This 
species has no eclipse 
plumage like the majori- 
ty of the Weaver-tribe — ■ 
there is no more difference between his summer and winter garb 
than is the case with the EngHsh chaffinch. He had never 
known the joys of married H^i! or built a nest before he came to 
Ne.ot of Red-billed Weaver. 
