L. collaris, Lin. &c. Collared Shrike. Fiscal of Le vaillant. Black above, white beneath ; white scapulars, and cuneated tail, edged with white. This last colour runs from each side of the lower part of the neck, behind the shoulder, and meets on the lower part of the back. The bill and legs are black. Twelve inches in length, and of a somewhat more slender form than the European sorts. Native of the interior of Africa, and very common at the Cape of Good Hope, where it may be observed in the gar dens, and sometimes in the street. According to Levail lant. when it sees a locust, a mantis, or a small bird, it springs on it, and instantly carries it off, to impale it on a thorn, and with such dexterity that the spine always passes through the head of the victim ; or, if a thorn can not readily be found, it fixes, with great address, the head of the captured animal between a division of two small branches. Every creature which it seizes, undergoes ex actly the same process, and it. thus continues to kill, and to store up its bloody acquisitions all day long, transfix ing many more carcasses than it ultimately devours. It
generally practises so to perch on the top of trees, espe cially on dry branches, that it pounces indiscriminately on all that comes in its way ; and, when hungry, it visits its gibbets, and selects what it prefers It is bold, vindictive, and very clamorous, chasing even birds of prey from its domain. Yet many of the predacious tribes profit by its collections, which are so widely scattered, that it is im possible to preserve them all. It flies low, mounting and descending by jerks; nestles in the fork of a tree, and lays four or five eggs. The male shares with the female the cares of incubation, and neither abandons the young till they have acquired sufficient strength to pro vide for themselves. In early age, these birds are very unlike what they are destined to become, in so much that one would take them for some very different species. The males, it has been observed, often wage furious and dead ly conflicts with one another, especially when two of them contend for a female.