The Flycatchers 
21 
cups was quite finished, and it contained no eggs. In the same 
season, at Kaukapakapa, Auckland, three fantail nests were 
found on one small branch of manuka. Two of the nests were 
only four inches apart, the third six inches from these. The 
breeding fantail is usually regarded as a pugnacious bird, but 
this seems to contradict the impression, betraying an unsus¬ 
pected sociable disposition. 
A note on other double nests discovered, may be found in the 
chapter on the thrush. 
Habits, etc .—Both birds are fairly abundant throughout 
New Zealand. The black fantail is, however, much less common 
in the North than in the South Island. They range from the 
seashore to the high lands of the interior, haunting the homes 
of men with as much cheerful confidence as they haunt the bush- 
clad valleys. They show little fear of man, and boldly enter 
by open door or window to hawk for flies. 
Though very different in appearance, the two differ little in 
habits, the black species being perhaps less restlessly active 
than the pied. The pied male mates with either pied or black 
female, and the black male similarly with either black or pied 
female. In the young of the mixed unions, however, the whole 
brood is either pied or black. 
The fantail is one of the most lively of the bush birds. It is 
often solitary, sometimes in pairs; and if in the neighbourhood 
can always be called with the lips and leaf twirled in the 
fingers. I have had five at one time come to the call, almost 
within reach, tweeting and singing and gyrating in perfect 
fearlessness. Of these three were black, and two were pied; 
and it is when they are together that the greater vivacity and 
volubility of the pied bird is apparent. On another occasion 
two birds came to the call. One was dark, the body above and 
below being a beautiful dark rich warm brown, the wings and 
tail jetty black; the other was pied. The former sat compara¬ 
tively quietly; but the little pied paragon constantly moved 
about and about, displaying to the full its almost erect, long, 
spread, rounded tail, spreading its wings downwards from 
the body at the same time, fluttering about very daintily, now 
