224 
Letters , Extracts , and Notes. 
The Birds of Gambia .—In 1901 we published in this 
Journal an excellent article on the Birds of the Gambia 
Colony drawn up by the late John S, Budgett ( f Ibis/ 1901, 
p. 481). Since then little ornithological news from the 
Gambia has reached us. But we are pleased to see that in 
f Bird-Notes/ the Journal of the “ Foreign Bird-Club/* 
edited by Mr. Wesley L. Page, Dr. E. Hopkinson, D.S.O., 
lias commenced a series of papers on the “ Birds of Gambia/* 
with which he seems to have a good acquaintance from 
personal observation (see ‘ Bird-Notes/ vol. viii. nos. 1-9) . 
Dr. Hopkinson begins with the Weavers, Finches, and 
Starlings, and then goes on to other Passerine groups, giving 
many interesting field-notes. Of the Great Black Ox-bird 
of Senegal (Textor albirustris ) he writes :— 
“Their nests are very striking; large masses of twigs occu¬ 
pied by several families, whose eggs are laid at the bottom of 
tunnels driven into the mass of twigs which form the nest. 
Whenever I have seen their nests they have been in large 
trees growing in certain villages, never outside in the bush. 
Sometimes in the upper part of a large cotton-tree are found 
Marabout Storks nesting, while lower down are the dwellings 
of the Ox-birds ; the latter, although belonging' to com¬ 
paratively small birds, being larger and stronger than those 
of the great Storks above them. 
“The hen of the Ox-bird is exactly like the cock, but the 
colour of the young is a rusty brown.”—E dd. 
