66 
PICARIAN BIRDS. 
some difficulty that I prevented them from shooting him before they continued 
their attack on the nest. When the hole was sufficiently enlarged, the man who 
had ascended thrust in his arm, but was so soundly bitten by the female, whose 
cries had become perfectly desperate, that he quickly withdrew it, narrowly 
escaping a tumble from his frail footing. After wrapping his hands in some folds 
of cloth, he succeeded with some trouble in extracting the bird, a miserable-looking- 
object enough, wasted and dirty. She was handed down and let loose on the 
ground, where she hopped about, unable to fly, and menacing the bystanders with 
her bill, and at length ascended a small tree, where she remained, being too stiff 
to use her wings. At the bottom of the hole, nearly three feet from the orifice, 
was a solitary egg, resting upon mud, fragments of bark and feathers.” 
The number of eggs laid by hornbills seems to vary, sometimes only one being 
met with, while at other times four or even five are found in the nest; the 
present species, apparently, never laying more than four. The female seems to 
assist in the matting-in of the nest-hole, using leaf-mould and earth, mixed with 
her own droppings and various decaying vegetable substances, so that the nests 
are often filthy and give forth an intolerable stench. In all probability the real 
reason for the retirement of the female hornbill into the recess of a tree, is that 
the bird is about to moult, and that this process is completed while concealed in 
the tree. Thus the emaciated condition of some of the birds, when liberated, could 
be accounted for, while their subsequent fat condition and good plumage would be 
the result of the completed moult. The hole is doubtless plastered up as a defence 
against enemies, of which the hornbills have plenty. The formidable bill of the 
birds is useful as a weapon of defence, as well as being of the needful shape to serve 
as a trowel for plastering up the hole of the tree. 
Wedge-Tailed The wedge-tailed hornbills, as the members of the second section 
HornbiUs. 0 f the typical subfamily are collectively termed, comprise several 
genera distinguished from the first section by the elongation of the central pair of 
feathers in the tail. In the case of the genus Berenicornis of Malaysia, as well 
as in the West African Ortholophus, the tail is very much elongated, and forms a 
graceful appendage of graduated feathers, which have conspicuous white tips. To 
this section of the hornbills belong the members of the genus Lophoceros, which is 
peculiar to Africa, and contains seventeen species. They are all small birds, 
compared with the general run of the species of Bucerotidce, and their mode of 
life seems to be somewhat different from those of the big hornbills of the east„ 
though they have the same habit of plastering up the female in a tree at the season 
of incubation. They are often found on the ground, and feed on berries, seeds, and 
insects; Mr. Andersson stating that he has found considerable quantities of sand in 
their stomachs, picked up by the birds when on the ground. Of the yellow-billed 
hornbill ( L. melanoleucas ) the above-named naturalist remarks that it “ is the most 
common of the hornbills in the middle of the southern parts of Damaraland. It 
is found singly or in pairs, and, being a comparatively fearless bird, is easily killed, 
especialty during the heat of the day, when it invariably perches on or near the- 
top of a lofty tree (where such are to be found), and will remain for hours in this 
situation, keeping up, with short intermissions, a kind of subdued chattering note 
of toe tdc ttfe tocke tocke tScke tdc, in a tone not unlike the quick yelping of young; 
