Sam R. Watkins - "Co. Aytch"

Various - "Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, June 20, 1891"

Various - "Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., Jan. 31, 1891"

J. Fenimore Cooper - "A Residence in France"

Books: Book review: 'The Mercy Papers' and 'Downtown Owl'
Moreover Technologies - Premier purveyor of real-time news and RSS feeds from across the Web

Book Review: The Horror, the Horror
Ad - Free Shipping on purchases over $59.95 of products online at Tennis Express.

How to live what Michael Pollan preaches
The Mercy Papers A Memoir of Three Weeks By Robin Romm 213 pages. Scribner. $22. The foundational condition of being human is that we're going to die. Almost as basic a truth is that we seem incapable of believing it. The collision of these inconsonant

A / B / C / D / E / F / G / H / I / J / K / L / M / N / O / P / R / S / T / U / V / W / Y / Z

The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 written by Allan O. Hume

A >> Allan O. Hume >> The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1




Other eggs subsequently obtained by Mr. Gammie are of much the same
character as those already described, but one is a good deal shorter
and broader, and the markings are more decided red than are some of
the yellowish-brown spots observable in the eggs first obtained.

In length the eggs seem to vary from 0.76 to 0.8, and in breadth from
0.54 to 0.58.




Subfamily LIOTRICHINAE.


235. Liothrix lutea (Scop.). _The Red-billed Liothrix_.

Leiothrix luteus (_Scop._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 250.
Leiothrix callipyga (_Hodgs._), _Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._
no. 614.

The Red-billed Liothrix breeds from April to August; at elevations of
from 3000 to 6000 feet, throughout the Himalayas south, as a rule, of
the first snowy range and eastward of the Sutlej; west of the Sutlej I
have not heard of its occurrence. It also doubtless breeds throughout
the hill-ranges running down from Assam to Burmah.

Mostly the birds lay in May, affecting well-watered and jungle-clad
valleys and ravines. They place their nests in thick bushes, at
heights of from 2 to 8 feet from the ground, and either wedge them
into some fork, tack them into three or four upright shoots between
which they hang, or else suspend them like an Oriole's or White-eye's
nest.

The nest varies from a rather shallow to a very deep cup, and is
composed of dry leaves, moss, and lichen in varying proportions,
bamboo-leaves being great favourites, bound together with slender
creepers, grass-roots, fibres, &c., and lined with black horse- or
buffalo-hair, or hair-like moss-roots. The nests differ much in
appearance: I have seen one composed almost entirely of moss, and
another of nothing but dry bamboo-sheaths, with a scrap or two of
moss. They are always pretty substantial, but sometimes they are very
massive for the size of the bird.

Three is certainly the usual complement of eggs.

According to Mr. Hodgson's notes, this species breeds in the central
mountainous region of Nepal, and lays from April to August. The nest,
which is somewhat purse-shaped, is placed in some upright fork between
three or four slender branches, to all of which it is more or less
attached. It is composed of moss, dry leaves, often of the bamboo, and
the bark of trees, and is compactly bound together with moss-roots and
fibres of different kinds; it is lined with horse-hair and moss-roots,
and contains generally three or four eggs.

The following note I quote _verbatim_:--"_Central Hills, August
12th_.--Male, female, and nest. Nest in a low leafy tree 5 cubits from
the ground in the Shewpoori forest; partly suspended and partly rested
on the fork of the branch; suspension effected by twisting part of the
material round the prongs of the fork; made of moss and lichens and
dry leaves, well compacted into a deep saucer-shaped cavity; 3.62
high, 4.5 wide outside, and inside 2.25 deep and 3 inches wide; eggs
pale verditer, spotted brown, and ready for hatching. The bird found
in small flocks of ten to twelve, except at breeding-season."

A nest sent to me last year by Mr. Gammie was found by him on the 24th
April, at an elevation of about 5000 feet, in the neighbourhood of
Rungbee. It was built by the side of a stream in a small bush, at a
height of about 3 feet from the ground, and contained three eggs.
The nest is a deep and, for the size of the bird, very massive cup,
exteriorly composed entirely of broad flag-like grass-leaves, with
which, however, a few slender stems of creepers are intermingled,
internally of grass-roots; the egg-cavity being thinly lined with
coarse, black buffalo-hair. Externally the nest is more than 5 inches
in diameter and nearly 4 inches high; but the egg-cavity, which is
very regularly shaped, is 21/2 inches in diameter and 2 inches in depth.

This year Mr. Gammie writes to me:--"I have taken many nests of the
Red-billed Liothrix here in our Chinchona reserves, at all elevations
from 3500 to 5000 feet. They breed in May and June, amongst dense
scrub, placing their nests in shrubs, at heights of from 3 to 5 feet
from the ground, and either suspending them from horizontal branches,
or hanging them between several upright stems, to which they firmly
attach them. The nest itself is cup-shaped and composed principally of
dry bamboo-leaves held together by a few fibres, and a few strings of
green moss wound round the outside. The lining consists of a few
black hairs, and the usual number of eggs is three. A nest I recently
measured was externally 4 inches in diameter and 2.7 in height, while
the cavity was 2.6 across by 1.9 in depth."

Mr. Gammie subsequently found a nest on the very late date of 17th
October at Rishap, Darjeeling. It contained three eggs, two of which
were addled.

Dr. Jerdon says that at Darjeeling he "got the nest and eggs
repeatedly; the nest made chiefly of grass, with roots and fibres, and
fragments of moss, and usually containing three or four eggs, bluish,
white, with a few purple and red blotches. It is generally placed in a
leafy bush at no great height from the ground. Gould, quoting from Mr.
Shore's notes, says that the eggs are black spotted with yellow:
this is of course erroneous. I have taken the nest myself on several
occasions, and killed the bird, and in every case the eggs were
coloured as above."

I wish to add here, as I have abused him occasionally, that Mr. Shore
was, I understand, a most excellent man, and that I have now come to
the conclusion that the extraordinary fictions that he recorded about
the eggs of birds can only have been due to colour-blindness of a
peculiarly aggravated nature. It is not that he mistook eggs, but that
he describes _impossible_ eggs--Kingfishers' eggs variegated black
and white, and here in this case black eggs spotted with yellow! Why,
there _are_ no such eggs in the whole world, I believe. On the other
hand, his whole life proves that he could not have deliberately set to
work to invent falsehoods. To return.

The eggs vary a good deal in shade and size, but are more or less long
ovals, slightly pointed towards the lesser end. The ground-colour is
a delicate very pale green or greenish blue, in one, not very common
type, almost pure white, and they are pretty boldly blotched or
spotted and speckled as the case may be, and clouded, most thickly
towards the large end, and very often almost exclusively in a zone or
cap round this latter, with various shades of red or purple and brown.
Some blotches in some eggs are almost carmine-red, but the majority
are brownish red or reddish brown, varying much in depth and intensity
of colour. There is something Shrike-like in the markings of many
eggs; and where the markings are most numerous, namely at the large
end, they are commonly intermingled with streaks and clouds of
pale lilac. The smaller end of the egg is often entirely free from
markings. I should mention that all the eggs have a faint gloss, and
that some are decidedly glossy.

They vary in length from 0.76 to 0.95, and in breadth from 0.59 to
0.66; but the average of thirty-four eggs is 0.85 by 0.62.


237. Pteruthius erythropterus (Vig.). _The Red-winged Shrike-Tit_.

Pteruthius erythropterus (_Vig.) Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 245; _Hume,
Rough Draft N. & E._ no. 609.

Writing from Murree, Colonel C.H.T. Marshall says:--"There is no
record about the nidification of this species. Its nest is exceedingly
difficult to find, and it was only by long and careful watching
through field-glasses that Captain Cock discovered that there was a
nest at the top of a very high chestnut-tree, to and from which the
birds kept flying with building-materials in their beaks. The nest is
most skilfully concealed, being at the top of the tree, with bunches
of leaves both above and below. The nest, like that of the Oriole, is
built pendent in a fork. It is somewhat roughly made of moss and hair.
The eggs are pinky white, blotched with red, forming in some a ring
round the larger end. They average 0.9 in length and 0.65 in breadth.
We were fortunate enough to secure two nests; both were more than 60
feet from the ground. Breeds in the end of May, at an elevation of
7000 feet."

Captain Cock says:--"I first found this bird building its nest on the
top of a high chestnut-tree at Murree in the month of May. When the
nest was ready I took my friend Captain C.H.T. Marshall to be present
at the taking of it, as it had never, I think, been taken before. We
took the nest on the 30th May.

"It was an open flattish cup, like the nest of _O. kundoo_ in
structure, only shallower. It contained three eggs, pinky white,
covered with a shower of claret spots that at the larger end formed a
cap of dark claret colour. Another nest, which I took in June from the
top of an oak, contained two eggs."

To Colonel Marshall and Captain Cock I am indebted for a nest and egg
of this species.

The nest is a moderately deep cup, suspended between two prongs of a
horizontal fork. Externally it is about 4 inches in diameter and about
3 inches in depth. The egg-cavity is nearly hemispherical, 3 inches
in diameter and 1.5 in depth. It is a very loosely made structure,
composed internally of not very fine roots and externally coated with
green moss. Along the lines of suspension a good deal of wool is
incorporated in the structure, and it is chiefly by this wool that the
nest is suspended. The fork is a slender one, the prongs being from
0.3 to 0.4 in diameter.

The egg is a broad oval, a good deal pointed towards the small
end. The shell is very fine and compact, and has a fine gloss. The
ground-colour is white or pinky white, and is pretty thickly speckled
and finely spotted all over with brownish red and a little pale inky
purple. Just towards the large end the markings are very dense, and
form, more or less of a confluent cap of mingled brownish red and pale
lilac, the latter everywhere appearing to underlie the former.

The egg was taken on the 10th June, and measures 0.9 by 0.68.


239. Pteruthius melanotis, Hodgs. _The Chestnut-throated
Shrike-Tit_.

Allotrius oenobarbus, _Temm. apud Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 246.
Allotrius melanotis, _Hodgs., Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._ no. 611.

According to Mr. Hodgson's notes and figures, the Chestnut-throated
Shrike-Tit breeds in Sikhim and Nepal up to an elevation of 6000 or
7000 feet. The nest is placed at a height of 6 to 10 feet from the
ground, between some slender, leafy, horizontal fork, between which it
is suspended like that of an Oriole or White-eye. It is composed of
moss and moss-roots and vegetable fibres, beautifully and compactly
woven into a shallow cup some 4 inches in diameter, and with a cavity
some 2.5 in diameter and less than 1 in depth. Interiorly the nest is
lined with hair-like fibres and moss-roots; exteriorly it is adorned
with pieces of lichen. The eggs are two or three in number,
very regular ovals, about 0.77 in length by 0.49 in width. The
ground-colour is a delicate pinky lilac, and they are speckled and
spotted with violet or violet-purple, the markings being most numerous
towards the large end, where they have a tendency to form a mottled
zone.


243. Aegithine tiphia (Linn.). _The Common Iora_.

Iora zeylonica (Gm.) _et_ I. typhia (_Linn.), Jerd. B. Ind._
ii, pp. 101, 103.
Aegithine tiphia (_Linn.), Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._ nos. 467, 468.

I have already on several occasions (see especially 'Stray Feathers,'
1877, vol. v, p. 428) recorded my inability to distinguish as
distinct species _Ae. tiphia_ and _Ae. zeylonica_. I am quite open to
conviction; but believing them, so far as my present investigations
go, to be inseparable, I propose to treat them as a single species in
the present notice.

The Common Iora (the genus, though possibly nearly allied, is too
distinct from _Chloropsis_ to allow me to adopt, as Jerdon does, one
common trivial name for both) breeds in different localities from May
to September. I have taken nests and eggs of typical examples of both
supposed species, and have had them sent me with the parent birds by
many correspondents; and though both vary a good deal, I am convinced
that all the variations which occur in the nests and eggs of one
race occur also in those of the other. If one gets only two or three
clutches of the eggs of each, great differences, naturally attributed
to difference of species (see Captain Cock's remarks, _infra_), may
be detected; but I have seen more than fifty, and, so far as I am
concerned, I have no hesitation in asserting that, as in the case of
the birds so in that of their nests and eggs, no constant differences
can be detected if only sufficiently large series are compared.

The birds build usually on the upper surface of a horizontal bough, at
a height of from 10 to 25 feet from the ground. Sometimes, when the
bough is more or less slanting, the nest assumes somewhat more of a
pocket-shape. Occasionally it is built between three or four slender
twigs, forming an upright fork; but this is quite exceptional.

As a rule nests of the Iora very closely resemble those of
_Leucocerca_, so much so that when I sent a beautiful photograph of a
nest, which I had myself watched building, of the latter species to
Mr. Blyth, he unhesitatingly pronounced it to be a nest of the former.
There is, however, a certain amount of difference; the Iora's nests
are looser and somewhat less compact and firm. My experience does not
confirm Mr. Brooks's remarks (_vide infra_) that they are usually
shallower; on the contrary all those now before me are, as indeed all
the many I can remember to have seen were, deep, thin-walled cups,
which had been placed on more or less horizontal branches, not
uncommonly where some upright-growing twig afforded the nest
additional security. The egg-cavity averages about 2 inches in
diameter, and varies from an inch to 11/4 inch in depth; the walls,
composed of vegetable fibres, and varying in different specimens
from only one eighth to three eighths of an inch in thickness, are
everywhere thickly coated externally with cobwebs, by which also the
nest is firmly attached to the branch on which it is seated, as well
as, where such adjoin the nest, to any little twig springing from that
branch. Interiorly they are more or less neatly lined with very fine
grass-stems. The bottom of the nest in its thinnest part is rarely
above one eighth of an inch in thickness, but running, as it so often
does, down the curving sides of the branch, it becomes a good deal
thicker, and where placed on a small branch, say not exceeding an
inch in diameter, the lateral portions of the bottom of the nest are
sometimes more than half an inch in thickness.

One nest which I obtained recently in the Botanical Gardens at
Calcutta was built in an upright fork of four slender twigs; and in
this case the bottom of the nest was obtusely conical, and at its
deepest point may have been nearly an inch in depth. I have never seen
a similar nest.

The eggs are normally three in number, but I have at times found only
two, and these more or less incubated.

Mr. Brooks, writing of a nest he took in the Mirzapoor District,
says:--"Did you ever get particulars of the nest of _Iora zeylonica_
on the forked branch of a mango-tree 12 or 14 feet from the
ground? Nest composed of the same materials as that of _Leucocerca
albifrontata_, but not quite so neat and much more shallow; eggs
salmon-coloured and spotted with pale reddish brown, intermixed with a
few larger dashes of purple-grey. The bird lays in July; three eggs.
This is the only nest I have not taken since I came to India the
second time."

From Raipoor, Mr. F.R. Blewitt remarks:--"The Iora breeds from July to
September, and certainly _not_, as Dr. Jerdon supposes, twice a year.
Both birds assist in the building of the nests, and there evidently
appears to be no choice of any particular kind of tree on which to
build. I have found them indiscriminately on the mango, mowah, neem,
and other trees. The nest is invariably made either just above or
between the fork of two outshooting slender horizontal branches. It
is very neatly made, deeply cup-shaped, of grass and fibres, with
spider's web on the exterior. The maximum number of eggs is three;
they are of a pale whitish colour, marked generally, chiefly at the
broad end, with brownish spots. The brown spots vary in size on
different eggs. I secured the first eggs on the 12th July, and the
last on the 2nd September. A pair of birds were on this last date just
completing their nest, which unfortunately was destroyed by the heavy
rains."

Captain Cock says:--"_Iora tiphia_ is tolerably common at Seetapoor
(Oudh), and I have several times taken their nests and eggs. I may
here mention that I have taken eggs of _Iora zeylonica_ at Etawah, and
that knowing the birds well, I can say that it is quite a distinct
bird; although in the marking of its eggs there is a slight
resemblance, yet the nests of the two species are quite different. On
the 13th May I observed a nest of _I. tiphia_ on a young mango-tree,
at the edge of a croquet-ground in our garden. I shot both male and
female and took the eggs; the nest was placed on the upperside of a
sloping bough, was covered outside with cobweb, and lined with thin
dry grass. It contained two fresh eggs of a delicate pink colour, with
broad irregularly-shaped dashes of light brown down the sides of the
shell, not tending to coalesce in any way at either apex. Another pair
also built their nest on the edge of the same ground in another tree;
but unfortunately in a weak moment I pointed out the nest to a lady
friend, and as thereafter no one ever played croquet on the ground
without staring at the nest, the birds got disgusted and soon deserted
it."

To this I need merely add that _of course_ typical _Ae. tiphia_
and typical _Ae. zeylonica_ are very distinct, but that as every
intermediate form occurs, they are not, according to my views of what
constitutes a species, entitled to specific separation, and that as
regards nest and eggs, according to my experience, every variety in
the one is to be found in the other.

Dr. Jerdon, speaking of Southern India, remarks:--"I have seen the
nest and eggs on several occasions. The nest is deep, cup-shaped, very
neatly made with grass, various fibres, hairs, and spiders' webs; and
the eggs, two or three in number, are reddish white, with numerous
darker red spots, chiefly at the thicker end. It breeds in the south
of India in August and September; perhaps, however, twice a year."

Writing from South Wynaad, Mr. J. Darling (Junior) says:--"I found the
nest, which with the eggs and both parents I have now sent you, in the
Teriat Hills on the 24th May, at an elevation of about 2300 feet. It
was placed on, and near the extremity of, a bough, at a height of
about 10 feet from the ground. It is round, about 2 inches in height
and the same in diameter, and the cavity was about an inch or a trifle
more in depth. It is built of grass and reed-bamboo-fibres, and is
coated with spider's web. It only contained two eggs."

Both parents (sexes ascertained by dissection) are in the typical
_tiphia_ plumage, without one particle of black on either head, nape,
or back.

Mr. Davidson writes:--"In the Satara and Sholapur districts the cock
puts on his summer plumage in May and the whole back of head, neck,
and back (not rump) is glossy and black.

"This bird lays from the end of June to beginning of August. It is
very shy when building and is easily caused to forsake its nest; if a
single egg is taken from the nest it does not forsake it, however, but
lays on (three instances this year)."

Mr. W.E. Brooks has favoured me with the following very interesting
note on the habits of this Iora:--

"Ioras are very numerous and have such a variety of notes that I
thought at first there were several sorts; but as far as I can see
there is but one species. Iora spreads its tail in a wonderful manner,
and comes spinning round and round towards the ground looking more
like a round ball than a bird. All the time it descends it utters a
strange note, something like that of a frog or cricket, a protracted
sibilant sound. This bird is close to _Liothrix_ and _Stachyrhis_,
although it belongs to the plains."

Colonel Butler writes:--"A nest on the 17th August, 1880, on the
outside branch of a silk-cotton tree in Belgaum about 12 feet from the
ground, containing three fresh eggs.

"I found many other nests building all through the hot weather and
rains; but in every single instance except the present one they were
deserted before they were completed."

Major Bingham writes from Tenasserim:--"This species is common
throughout the country. As a rule its nest is well hid, but one I
saw in the compound of a house in Maulmain was placed in the exposed
leafless fork of a tree, not above six feet from the ground. It
contained no eggs when I examined it, and was deserted a day or two
after. This was in the beginning of May."

Mr. Oates remarks on the breeding of this bird in Pegu:--"Nests are
found chiefly in June and July, but the birds probably lay also in
May."

In shape the eggs are moderately broad ovals, slightly pointed towards
one end. They vary, however, a good deal, some being much more
elongated than others. They are almost entirely devoid of gloss. The
ground-colour is generally greyish white, but some have creamy and
some a salmon tinge; typically they have numerous long streaky pale
brown or reddish-brown blotches, chiefly confined to the large end,
where they often seem to spring from an irregular imperfect zone of
the same colour. The colour of the blotches varies a good deal. In
some it is a pale greyish or purplish brown; in others decidedly
reddish, or even well-marked and somewhat yellowish brown. Some pale,
purplish streaks and clouds generally underlie the brown blotches
where they are thickest, and there form a kind of nimbus. In some eggs
the markings are confined to a narrow imperfect zone of pale purplish
specks or very tiny blotches round the large end, and some of the eggs
remind one of those of _Leucocerca albifrontata_. The peculiar streaky
longitudinal character of the markings, almost wholly confined to the
large end, best distinguishes the eggs of the Ioras from those of any
other Indian bird with which they are likely to be confounded.

In length they vary from 0.63 to 0.76, and in breadth from 0.51 to
0.57: but the average of forty-seven eggs measured is 0.69, nearly, by
a trifle more than 0.54.


246. Myzornis pyrrhura, Hodgs. _The Fire-tailed Myzornis_.

Myzornis pyrrboura, _Hodgs., Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 263; _Hume, Rough
Draft N. & E._ no. 629.

I have received a single egg said to belong to the Fire-tailed
Myzornis from Native Sikhim, where it was found in May in a small nest
(unfortunately mislaid) which was placed on a branch of a large tree
at no great height from the ground. The place where it was found had
an elevation of about 10,000 feet. Although the parent bird was sent
with the egg, I cannot say that I have any great confidence in its
authenticity, and only record the matter _quantum valeat_.

The egg is a very regular, rather elongated oval. The egg was never
properly blown and has been consequently somewhat discoloured. It may
have been pure white, and it may have been fairly glossy when fresh,
but it is now a dull ivory-white with scarcely any gloss. It measured
0.68 in length by 0.5 in breadth.


252. Chloropsis jerdoni (Bl.). _Jerdon's Chloropsis_.

Phyllornis jerdoni, _Bl., Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 97; _Hume, Rough Draft
N. & E._ no. 463.

I have never myself found the nest of Jerdon's Chloropsis, but my
friend Mr. F.R. Blewitt has sent me numerous specimens of both nests
and eggs from Raipoor and its neighbourhood.

In that part of the country July and August appear to be the months in
which it lays; but elsewhere its eggs have been taken in April, May,
and June, so that its breeding-season is much the same as that of many
of the Bulbuls. The nest is a small, rather shallow cup, at most 31/2
inches in diameter and 11/2 in depth; is composed externally entirely of
soft tow-like vegetable fibre, which appears to be worked over a light
framework of fine roots and slender tamarisk-stems, amongst which,
some little pieces of lichen are intermingled. There is no attempt
at a lining, the eggs being laid on the fine grass and slender twigs
(about the thickness of an ordinary-sized pin) which compose the
framework of the nest.

The eggs as a rule appear to be two in number.

Mr. Blewitt remarks:--"The Green Bulbul breeds in July and August. The
bird does not preferentially select any one description of tree for
its nest, though the greater number secured were taken from mowah
trees (_Bassia latifolia_). The nest is generally firmly affixed at
the fork of the end twigs of an upper branch from 15 to 25 feet from
the ground. Sometimes, however, eschewing twigs, the bird constructs
its nest on the _top_ of the main branch itself, cunningly securing it
with the material to the rough exterior surface of the branch.
Three is certainly the maximum number of eggs. During the period of
nidification the parent birds are very watchful and noisy, and their
alarm and over-anxiety on the near approach of a stranger often betray
the nest."