772 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XII. 



in possession and have brought up one or more broods of young in it 

 The Swallows have built themselves another nest in a building some 200 yards 

 removed froui this. I was curi' us to know if the Swalh ws had left any 

 eggs in the nest when r^ispos^■essed of it, and whether the Swifts had hatched 

 them, but I could not see into the nest, owing tn its position, without break- 

 ing it open 5 nor did I see any broken eggs thrown out under the nest or any 

 young ones about, as I did in the previous two seasons when the Swallows 

 were there. 



Is it not curious that a bird should take possession of the nest of another 

 when occupied, and more especially th;it nest of another species, and quite 

 different in material, if not in make, from its own nest ? 



NORMAN F. T. TROUP. 



Kausaxie, KoMAUN, Sth August, 189'c. 



No. XV.— THE NIDIFICATION OF SOME MALAYAN BIRDS. 

 The Thick-billfd Spider-huntee (Arachnothera crasszVos^ns, Seichb). — 

 I obtained the eggs of this Spider-hunter on March 17th this year at 

 Kenong, in Selangor. The nest was an oval structure, about 11 inches long 

 and 5^ inches in diameter, sewn to the underside of a large plantain leaf, 

 (Jtlusa), and composed entirely of dried plantain fibre. The entrance was at 

 the side against the leaf, which formed part of the back wall of the nest. 

 There were two fresh eggs, beautiful little things, pure white with a broad 

 zone formed by a tangled confusion of the slenderest lines scrawled in a 

 dark blackish-brown pigment, the fantastic and delicate tracery reminding 

 one of the wizard Merlin's book with " the text no bigger than the limbs 

 of fleas." 



The eggs measured Hx^ and tIxH. 



The Cinnamon-headed Geeen Pigeon {Osmotreron fulvicolUs, Wa"!.), — 

 I took a pair of eggs of this handsome pigeon in Pahang in May, The nidi- 

 fication, which is of course exactly similar to that of other green pigeons of 

 the genus, is not described in Vol. IV of the Birds in the " Fauna of British 

 India,'' so perhaps it may be worth while to record the dimensions of the 

 eggs. They are rather short and broad, both measuring IsVxfl, the shell 

 of the usual Osmotreron texture and gloss. 



The nest was placed on a low tree in a little sandy island in the Pahang 

 River, on which I landed to try for a jungle-fowl ; the male bird flew out 

 of the tree from close to the nest, and I shot him before I noticed it. 



The Buemese Wattled Lapwing (Sarcor/ramHi?/,? atrinuchalis , Blyth) was 

 breeding along the Pahang River in May, and I obtained two clutches of 4 

 and 3 eggs, the clutch of three being considerably incubated. 



The Black and Red Bkoadlill {Cijmhorhynchus macrorhynchus, Gm.) 

 was also breeding in May, and I took two or three nests with eggs, one of 

 the pieces of material used, in one of them being the entire nest of a 

 small Sun-bird ! 



