The Noise Of The Evening
Before Was Now Explained.
A python had climbed up one of the
posts of the house, and had made his way under the thatch within
a yard of my head, and taken up a comfortable position in the
roof - and I had slept soundly all night directly under him.
I called to my two boys who were skinning birds below and said,
"Here's a big snake in the roof;" but as soon as I had shown it
to them they rushed out of the house and begged me to come out
directly. Finding they were too much afraid to do anything, we
called some of the labourers in the plantation, and soon had half
a dozen men in consultation outside. One of these, a native of
Bouru, where there are a great many snakes, said he would get him
out, and proceeded to work in a businesslike manner. He made a
strong noose of rattan, and with a long pole in the other hand
poked at the snake, who then began slowly to uncoil itself. He
then managed to slip the noose over its head, and getting it well
on to the body, dragged the animal down. There was a great
scuffle as the snake coiled round the chairs and posts to resist
his enemy, but at length the man caught hold of its tail, rushed
out of the house (running so quick that the creature seemed quite
confounded), and tried to strike its head against a tree. He
missed however, and let go, and the snake got under a dead trunk
close by. It was again poked out, and again the Bourn man caught
hold of its tail, and running away quickly dashed its head with a
swing against a tree, and it was then easily killed with a
hatchet. It was about twelve feet long and very thick, capable of
doing much mischief and of swallowing a dog or a child.
I did not get a great many birds here. The most remarkable were
the fine crimson lory, Eos rubra - a brush-tongued parroquet of a
vivid crimson colour, which was very abundant. Large flocks of
them came about the plantation, and formed a magnificent object
when they settled down upon some flowering tree, on the nectar of
which lories feed. I also obtained one or two specimens of the
fine racquet-tailed kingfisher of Amboyna, Tanysiptera nais, one
of the most singular and beautiful of that beautiful family.
These birds differ from all other kingfishers (which have usually
short tails) by having the two middle tail-feathers immensely
lengthened and very narrowly webbed, but terminated by a spoon-
shaped enlargement, as in the motmots and some of the humming-
birds. They belong to that division of the family termed king-
hunters, living chiefly on insects and small land-molluscs, which
they dart down upon and pick up from the ground, just as a
kingfisher picks a fish out of the water. They are confined to a
very limited area, comprising the Moluccas, New Guinea and
Northern Australia.
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