MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 081 



The builders had evidently had little practice in open air building and the nest 

 was a clumsy one, and had a dome over it. Wishing to encourage the race to 

 leave my bungalow alone and revert to trees, I spared the nest, but some native 

 boys, seeing my interest in it, as soon as my back was turned, pulled it to pieces. 

 The only well finished part of it, as well as I could see, was the entrance passage. 



The same birds have now a nest in another tree close by and about it is 

 this point of interest, viz., that the nest was commenced by a pair of Munias 

 and I am not sure but that the Munias have not even now a share in it. I can- 

 not observe too closely for fear of this nest being destroyed as the other one was. 



The following too about other birds may interest our readers. A friend of 

 mine had a pair of geese. The female bird after laying died. The eggs were 

 placed under a fowl and duly hatched out. Then the poor hen tried to feed 

 them, clucking diligently and scratching the ground for them, but with no 

 success. The widower, however, heard the goslings before he saw them and 

 coming up he sent their foster-mother to the right-about in no time and took 

 charge himself, feeding them carefully and nestling them under his wings. He 

 has continued his care and allows no one else to touch them. 



T. BOMFORD, Revd. 

 Dera Ismael Khan, April 1908. 



No. XIV.— THE OOLOGY OF INDIAN PARASITIC CUCKOOS. 



In Vol. XVII, page 892, Mr. Stuart Baker mentions some eggs sent to him 

 by Mr. Primrose and myself. I gave him a long account of the finding of the 

 nests, and our reasons for supposing them to be cuckoo's eggs and to belong 

 to the Violet Cuckoo (Chryaococcyx xanthorhynchus), and not to the Rufous- 

 bellied Cuckoo (Cacomantis merulinus). Mr. Primrose and myself have taken 

 some seven or eight nests of the Himalayan Yellow-backed Sunbird (JEthopyga 

 seheriw) containing what we consider cuckoo's eggs. Our reasons for consider- 

 ing them cuckoo's eggs and attributing them to the Violet Cuckoo are as 

 follows : — 



At least some twenty nests of this sun-bird were taken which contained eggs 

 and only seven or eight had any eggs in them which differed from the type of 

 the undoubted sun-bird's eggs, and in every case there was only a single egg in 

 each nest which differed from the others. In every case the single egg was 

 larger and quite differently marked from the others in the nest. Had they not 

 been cuckoo's eggs one would have expected to find a clutch of eggs of that 

 type, but in no instance was this the case, so I think we may safely consider 

 these eggs parasitic and belonging to a cuckoo. 



Now let us consider by elimination the species of cuckoo to which these eggs 

 belong. The only small cuckoos we noticed or shot in the Oooma Reserve were 

 the Violet Cuckoo and the Drongo Cuckoo (Sumiculus luguhris). Mr. Primrose 

 also informs me that though he and his collector were always on the look-out 

 for good cuckoos they never came across any Cacomantis ; in fact the only small 

 cuckoos they ever got were those mentioned by me. The Violet and Drongo 



