3-028-674 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

New arrivals at the Zoological Society's Gardens: Hornbills, 1870. 'The Hornbills are a family of birds which inhabit the tropics of Asia and Africa, dwelling in the deepest jungles and forests, and feeding principally upon ripe fruits. They are very remarkable for the large size and curious forms of their beaks, which vary much in the different species, and attain huge proportions in some of them. In most of them, also, the feet are very singularly formed, the three toes in front being joined together for some distance from the base, so that it is almost impossible for them to make much progress on the ground, while they are thus especially adapted for an arboreal life...The large figure in front represents the white-faced male, and the adjoining figure is the black female of the plait-billed hornbill (Buceros Plicatus), while in the background is a figure of a female of the slender hombill (Buceros Gracilis). These three birds have recently arrived from Sumatra and Malacca, where they were taken as nestlings from the forest-trees in which they were bred last summer. Their bills are consequently not yet fuller developed, and will attain much larger proportions as the birds grow older'. From "Illustrated London News, 1870.