276 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE.

The We come now to the third division of the
Starlings. Passeres or perching birds, to which Mr. Wallace
attaches the name of the starlings. “The starlings or Sturvs-
da,” says Dr. Percival Wright, “are a well marked old-world
group. No species of the family are found in Australia.”
Tho The Common Starling is a bird of passage,
Common arriving in England about the beginning of March
Sterling and leaving some time in October. Knapp says:—
“There is something singularly curious and mysterious in
the conduct of these birds previously to their nightly retire-
ment, by the variety and intricacy of the evolutions they
execute at that time. They will form themselves, perhaps,
into a triangle, then shoot into a long, pear-shaped figure,
expand like a sheet, wheel into a ball, as Pliny observes,
each individual striving to get into the centre, etc., with a
promptitude more like parade movements than the actions of
birds. As the breeding season advances, these prodigious
flights divide, and finally separate into pairs, and form their
summer settlements.” The Starling is a handsome bird and
usually nests in old buildings, though it has a preference for
a dove-cote if it can gain admission. It is a peaceable
bird and for all its military evolutions does not seem to war
with other species. Its domestic character is also good.
The Weaver Lhe Weaver birds which are included in this
Bird. = division, are a very interesting species. They
belong to Africa, where they hang their nests upon trees,
those of the sociable weaver birds giving the trees the
appearance of partially thatched wall-less structures. Le Vaillant
thus describes his experience of the sociable weaver bird: he
says:—“TI observed, on the way, a tree with an enormous nest
of these birds, to which I have given the appellation of
republicans; and as soon as I arrived at my camp, I dis-
patched a few men with a wagon to bring it to me, that
I might open the hive and examine its structure in its minutest
parts. When it arrived, I cut it to pieces with a hatchet