ding up an expert climber with
a tin half-full of sawdust to which a long string is attached. The
climber lets down the eggs or nestlings in the tin and the observer
can examine them in comfort on _terra firma_. The parent crows do not
appear to notice how unlike the young koels are to their own
nestlings, for they feed them most assiduously and make a great uproar
when the koels are taken from the nest. Baby crows are noisy
creatures; koels are quiet and timid at first, but become noisier as
they grow older.

The feathers of crow nestlings are black in each sex. Young koels fall
into three classes: those of which the feathers are all black, those
of which a few feathers have white or reddish tips, those which are
speckled black and white all over because each feather has a white
tip. The two former appear to be young cocks and the last to be hens.
Baby koels, in addition to hatching out before their foster-brethren,
develop more quickly, so that they leave the nest fully a week in
advance of the young corvi. After vacating the nest they squat for
some days on a branch close by; numbers of them are to be seen thus in
suitable localities towards the end of July. At first the call of the
koel is a squeak, but later it takes the form of a creditable, if
ludicrous, attempt at a caw. The young cuckoo does not seem to be able
to distinguish its foster-parents from other crows; it clamours for
food whenever any crow comes near it.

Of the scenes characteristic of the rains in India none is more
pleasing than that presented by a colony of nest-building bayas or
weaver-birds (_Ploceus baya_). These birds build in company. Sometimes
more than twenty of their wonderful retort-like nests are to be seen
in one tree. This means that more than forty birds are at work, and,
as each of these indulges in much cheerful twittering, the tree in
question presents an animated scene. Both sexes take part in
nest-construction.

Having selected the branch of a tree from which the nest will hang,
the birds proceed to collect material. Each completed nest contains
many yards of fibre not much thicker than stout thread. Such material
is not found in quantity in nature. The bayas have, therefore, to
manufacture it. This is easily done. The building weaver-bird betakes
itself to a clump of elephant-grass, and, perching on one of the
blades, makes a notch in another near the base. Then, grasping with
its beak the edge of this blade above the notch