632 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIX. 



balance the nest correctly and to prevent its being blown about by the wind. 

 In one nest recently examined there were about 3 ounces of clay in six 

 different patches." 



I think there can be little doubt that the object of the clay is to prevent the 

 nest being blown about by the wind. 



" From my own observation," writes Legge, " I find these lumps of clay are 

 but seldom used in Ceylon, perhaps because the Bayas do not build during 

 the windiest months of the year ; and I have noticed that in a whole colony of 

 nests built in a sheltered hill-side no clay was used." 



McNair's statement that Baya's nests weigh from two to five ounces lends 

 support to this view. The difference in weight must be largely due to the 

 varying quantity of clay used ; the more wind-swept the locality the more 

 mud would be necessary to steady the nest. 



The last point that remains to be decided is the truth or falsehood of the 



fire-fly story. 



Natives believe that the Baya sticks fire-flies on these lumps of mud or clay. 

 This story was inserted in Oliver Goldsmith's Natural Histori/ and from that 

 has been copied into almost every popular book on birds. 



Jerdon. Hume and E. H. Aitken all disbelieve the fire-fly story, and I must 



say that I agree with them. 



In Birds of the Plains cp. 188) I wrote: "Sometime ago a correspondent 

 living on the west coast of India informed me that Weaver-birds are very 

 abundant in that part of the country, that their nests are everywhere to be 

 seen and that he had noticed fire-flies stuck into many of them. He asked if I 

 could explain their presence. I suggested in reply that he had made a mistake 

 and requested him to look carefully next nesting season, that is to say in August, 

 and if he came upon a single nest on to which a fire-fly was stuck, to take it 

 down fire-flies and all, and send it to me at my expense. Since then August 

 has come and gone thrice, and I have heard nothing from my correspondent ! " 

 I thought that this pretty effectively settled the fire-fly question, but unfortu- 

 nately I have lost the address of the correspondent. 



At the time of writing the above I had not seen Major McNair's second 

 Monograph of Ploceus baya which appeared on page 46 of Vol. XIII (1902) of 

 Nature Notes-The Magazine of the Selborne Club. McNair admits that 

 althou-h he has several nests with the mud, there is no sign of tuere having 

 been Tny portion of an insect attached ; but he quotes other evidence, which, 

 if correct, would leave little room for doubt that the fire-fly story is true. 



The first witness he quotes is " a Mr. Assistant Commissioner Buckley, of 

 the Salt Revenue Department, who for many years has devoted himself to 

 Natural History, and he writes from Marwar or Jodhpur, Rajputana, under 

 dates February 21 and April 11, 1900 : ' You, of course, know the shape of the 

 breeding, nest of these bayahs ; besides the nest proper the male builds a 

 ' ihoola° or swing for himself alongside this breeding nest. This ' jhoola ' is 

 about six inches long and open at the bottom, with a bar of worked grass from 



