THE CON CAY E-CASQUE D HORN BIEL. 
Buceros bicornis. 
Plate XXIX. 
The Ilornbills, or Baceroti/J/e of Naturalists, constitute a very singular and very distinct family of birds, 
allied, according to the best authorities, to the King-fishers ( Alcedinidw ) and the Hoopoes ( Upupidai ), but 
readily known, in most cases, by the great size of the bill, which organ, in some species, attains prodigious 
dimensions. 
According to Mr. Wallace, to whom we are indebted for some interesting notes on this family of birds, 
upwards of forty species of Ilornbills are now known to science, of which about half are found in Africa, and 
the other half in Southern Asia and the larger Asiatic Islands. One of the finest species of the whole group 
is the Concave-casqued Hornbill, which inhabits the hill-forests throughout India, and extends along the 
Malayan peninsula into Sumatra. As long ago as 1833, a single specimen of this curious bird was living for 
a short time in the Society’s Gardens, but it was not till the summer of 1864 that the species was established as 
a permanent denizen of our Aviaries. In July of that year two specimens of the Concave-casqued Hornbill 
were brought to England in excellent condition by Mr. Thompson, the Society’s head keeper (who had been 
sent out to Calcutta to bring home a collection of interesting animals offered to the Society by its various 
correspondents in the East), and have since lived in good health in the Rcgent’s-park Gardens. 
In Nepal this Hornbill is called the “Ilomrai,” or “ King of the Jungles,” and tenants the lower ranges 
of the hills contiguous to the plains, extending up to an altitude of from 3000 to 5000 feet. Mr. Hodgson tells 
us that it particularly affects the Burr and Pipul trees ( Ficus religiosa and F. indica), loving the lofty perch 
which these monarchs of the forests afford, and being passionately fond of their fruit. “The Ilomrai,” 
continues the same author, “ is gregarious, of staid and serious manners and motions, full of confidence and 
quietness, and seeming to prefer the few open and cultivated spots in the wilds it inhabits; which spots are 
usually limited to the banks of rivers. There perched on the top of some high fantastic Burr-tree, you may 
see this large, grotesque, and solemn bird sit motionless for hours, with its neck concealed between the high 
shoulders of its wings, and its body sunk upon its tarsi. Occasionally it will take a short flight, accompanied 
hy one or two companions (for it is a social bird), to some other high tree; never, so far as I have observed, 
alighting on the ground, nor on a low tree. Twenty or thirty birds are commonly found in the same 
immediate vicinity, six or eight upon the same tree, if it bo large; and they will continue perched for hours 
with the immovable gravity of judges, now and then exchanging a few syllables in the most subdued tone of 
a voice as uncouth as their forms and manners. This subdued articulation is not louder than, and is similar 
in character with, the low croaking of a bull-frog. But if the remorseless gunner intrude upon this solemn 
congress, and bring down, without mortally wounding, one of its members, the clamours of the captive bird 
will utterly amaze him. I cannot liken this vehement vociferation to anything but the braying of a jackass; 
its power is extraordinary, and is the consequence of an unusually osseous structure of the rings of the 
trachea and of the larynx.” 
Like other Ilornbills the present species makes its nest in a hollow tree, and exhibits some very 
remarkable habits during its indification, of which Mr. Wallace speaks as follows; 
“ As soon as the female has deposited her eggs the male imprisons her in the tree by closing up the 
entrance with clay and gummy substances, leaving only a small hole out of which she puts the tip of her 
bill to receive the fruits with which he keeps her well supplied. She is kept shut up in this manner, some say, 
till the young are hatched, others, till they are fledged. In the interior of Sumatra, in January 1862, one of 
my hunters brought me a male Concave Hornbill ( Buceros bicornis), which, he told me, ho had shot when in 
the act of feeding its mate. On going with him to the spot, I saw a hole in the trunk of a large tree, about 
twenty feet from the ground, out of which the bill of a hornbill was partially protruding. With great 
difficulty I persuaded some natives to climb the tree and bring me the bird, which they did, alive; and along 
with it a young one, apparently not many days old, and a most remarkable object. It was about the size of a 
half-grown duckling, but so flabby and semi-transparent as to resemble a bladder of jelly furnished with head, 
legs, and rudimentary wings, but not a sign of a feather, except a few lines of points indicating where they 
would come.” 
This remarkable habit was long considered to exist only in the imagination of the natives, but the story 
has recently been confirmed by various independent observers, and, there can be no doubt, is strictly founded 
on fact. 
