My Little iiiiaus. 
79 
ol)icctin!^- to be dislodi^ed therefrom. Their flight is an easy 
one— a few rapid beats of the wing's and then a king- glide. 
They are quick runners. l)Ut s])end most of their time in the trees, 
in which tliey climl) a1)out hke monkeys. VVitli small birds 
they are inoffensive, but with larger onQs they are inchned to 
be pugnacious. ( )n one occasion T introduced a Stone Curlew 
into their aviarv. In a moment they were all three at him. 
perching on his back and making the feathers fly: had T not 
quickly gone to the rescue, the poor Curlew would soon have 
been in a bad way. A pair of Californian Quail were not 
molested. 
I feed them on fruit, bread and milk, and biscuit meal. 
In the wild state they have an apparently loud call note, but I 
have never heard this. Mine greet me. whenever I visit them, 
with a low chuckle, and when being stroked or petted they have 
a comfy little cry, like that made by young chickens when being- 
brooded, but as my birds are females this may be the reason 
that I have not heard them, as it is possible that only the males 
call. Sad to say. I have recently lost two of these charming 
birds. On dissection both birds were found to have eggs in 
the ovary: and one had a most peculiar elongation of the 
trachea. This was prolonged beneath the skin of the breast 
until it reached the end of the brea.st bone, whence it retm-ned 
and entered the chest at the usual place. This pecuHarity is 
found in tht males of 0. 7'cluta. but apparently not in the 
females. T can hardly believe that my taxidermist has made a 
mistake in the sex of mine, as he was confident that the birds' 
ovary contained well grown eg^g^s. I sent the body afterwards 
to the British Museum, where they have it preserved. 
Writing from Yucatan of 0. vctnhi " Cha-cha-la-ca " Mr. 
C . F. Gunner says : 
" Thi.s bird spends most of its time in the trees, where it lives upon 
the fruit, flowers and tender leaves. Its neutral green plumage renders 
" it very difficult to spy out the bird. When disturbed it jumps to the 
" ground to spy out the n;iture of its danger, gives one or two long 
lenps. and again mounts upon a limb, from which it cjuickly flies from 
'■ one lirancli to another until it escapes in the distance. In the male the 
" trachea is wonderfully prolonged beneath the skin of the breast and 
" abdomen almost to the anus, whence it returns and enters the chest at 
" the usual i)lace. With this great trumpet-like instrument the bird makes 
;i pcculi.-ir noise, which may be heard at a league's distance. The song 
