There exists in Australia a bird with very curious customs. This is the satin bower-bird. The art displayed in this bird’s constructions is not less interesting than the sociability he gives evidence of, and his desire to have for his hours of leisure a shelter adorned to his taste. The bowers which he constructs, and which present on a small scale the appearance of the arbors in our old gardens, are places for reunion and for warbling and courtship, in which the birds stay during the day, when no anxiety leads them to disperse. They are not, properly speaking, nests built for the purpose of rearing young; for at the epoch of love each couple separates and constructs a special retreat in the neighborhood of the bower. These shelters are always situated in the most retired parts of the forest, and are placed on the earth at the foot of trees. Several couples work together to raise the edifice, the males performing the chief part of the work. At first they establish a slightly convex floor, made with interlaced sticks, intended to keep the place sheltered from the moisture of the soil. The arbor rises in the centre of this first platform. Boughs vertically arranged are interlaced at the base with those of the floor. The birds arrange them in two rows facing each other; they then curve together the upper extremities of these sticks, and fix them so as to obtain a vault. All the prominences in the materials employed are turned toward the outside, so that the interior of the room may be smooth and the birds may not catch their plumage in it. This done, the little architects, to embellish their retreat, transport to it a number of conspicuous objects, such as very white stones from a neighboring stream, shells, the bright feathers of the paroquet, whatever comes to their beak. All these treasures are arranged on the earth, before the two entries to the bower, so as to form on each side a carpet, which is not smooth, but the varied colors of which rejoice the eye. The prettiest treasures are fixed into the wall of the hut. These objects are intended solely for the delight of these feathered artists. They are very careful also only to collect pieces which have been whitened and dried by the sun. Certain humming-birds also, according to Gould, decorate their dwellings with great taste. “They instinctively fasten thereon,” he stated, “beautiful pieces of flat lichen, the larger pieces in the middle, and the smaller on the part attached to the branch. Now and then a pretty feather is intertwined or fastened to the outer sides, the stem being always so placed that the feather stands out beyond the surface.” In spite of their lack of skill and the inadequacy of their organs, fish are not the most awkward architects. The species which construct nests for laying in are fairly numerous; the classical case of the stickleback is always quoted, but this is not the only animal of its class to possess the secret of the manufacture of a shelter for its eggs.