probably sucked tbe eggs on the spot. We sought him everywhere, iu the hope that he might have 
preserved them, but he was not to be found. Through the kindness of my friend I was not wholly 
disappointed after all. The Black Stork laid two more eggs, which he secured and brought over to England 
the following summer. These are now in my collection. They are smaller than those of Cicoiiia alba, from 
which they may also be distinguished by a very faint greenish tinge being noticeable on closer inspection.” 
More commonly the Black Stork resorts to the distant forests for the purpose of nesting and rearing its 
young, particularly those which are interspersed with streams and pools of water or marshy flats. “ There 
towards the end of April,” says Mr. Hewitson, “it builds its nest in solitude near the top of one of the 
highest trees of the forest, for the most part upon that of the pine tree. The nest, though large, is less 
than that of the White Stork ; its foundation of sticks is rendered more firm and stable by the addition of 
sods of earth, the remainder of the nest being completed with finer sticks. The eggs are four in number, 
very like hut smaller than those of the White Stork.” 
The Black Stork is only an occasional or rare visitant to our islands, in proof of which I may mention 
that Yarrell enumerates only four specimens as having been killed in any part of them, namely — Colonel 
Montagu’s bird on West Sedge Moor, in Somersetshire, in May 1814; one on the Tamar, in Devonshire, 
in November 1831, now in the possession of E. H. Rodd, Esq., of Penzance ; another at Otley, near Ipswich 
in Suffolk, October 1832 ; and one on the south side of Poole Harbour, November 1839 ; to these, 
however, two more have been added by the Rev. F. O. Morris, namely, one killed on Market Weighton 
Common, in the East-Riding of Yorkshire, In October 1852, and a second, which Mr. Chaffey, of Dodington, 
Informed him had been killed in the Weald of Kent. In addition to these Mr. A. Newton informed Mr. 
Stevenson “ that Mr. Thornhill, of Riddlesworth, possesses a very fine specimen which he obtained in the 
flesh more than twenty years since of a labourer who had just shot It on some property of his own in 
Romney Marsh ; and in Mr. J. H. Gurney’s collection is a specimen said to have been killed at Poole in 
1849, just ten years later than the one before mentioned from the same locality.” Besides the above, 
W. Christy Horsfall, Esq., states in the ‘ Zoologist’ for 1862, under the date of September 8th, that he had 
just added to his collection a fine specimen which had been recently obtained at Hartlepool ; and the Hon. 
Augusta Annesley has called my attention to another, which her friend F. D. Hihhert, Esq., stated had been 
shot on Otmoor about the middle of November 1862. To these another has yet to he added : on the 14th 
of June 1867, I received a letter from Mr. Anthony Hammond informing me that a fine Black Stork had 
been shot on the banks of the river Nar, at Westacre, in the morning of the 19th of May. It had been 
about the meadows in the neighbourhood for a week and was alvvays fishing. It proved to be an adult 
female, weighing over seven pounds, and is now in the fine collection of birds at Westacre High House. 
The food of the Black Stork is precisely the same as that of its ally ; in its search it wades deep in the water 
and kills its prey by shaking and beating before swallowing it. When about to fly, the bird takes one or two 
short leaps, and, when alighting, skims a short distance before touching the ground, and places its wing- 
feathers in order before it moves on further. It readily submits to captivity, and never uses its powerful hill 
offensively against its companions. The oidy sound made by the bird appears to he the clattering one 
produced by the repeated sna])ping of Its mandibles. 
Mr. Jerdon mentions, in his ‘ Birds of India,’ that there “ this bird is considered one of the finest quarries 
for the Bhyri {Falco peregrbrus), and the day that a Black Stork is killed is marked by the Indian Falconer 
with a white stone.” 
There is no difference in the colouring of the sexes, and hut little in size ; the female is, however, a trifle 
smaller than the male. 
The portion shown of the principal figure is nearly of the natural size. 
