60 CEATBEOPODIDJE. 



tions of from 4000 to 7000 or 8000 feet, from Simla to Nepal, 

 during the latter half of April, May, and June. The nest is a 

 pretty compact, rather shallow cup, composed exteriorly of coarse 

 grass, in which a few dead leaves are intermingled ; it has no lining, 

 but the interior is composed of rather finer and softer grass than 

 the exterior, and a good number of dry needle-like fir-leaAes are 

 used toN^ards the interior. It is from 5 to 8 inches in diameter 

 exteriorly, and the cavity from 3 inches to 3*5 in diameter and 

 about 2 inches deep. The nest is usually placed in some low, 

 densely-foliaged branch of a tree, at say from 3 to 8 feet from the 

 ground ; but I recently obtained one placed in a thick tuft of 

 grass, growing at the roots of a young Deodar, not above 6 inches 

 from the ground. They lay four or live eggs. 



The first egg that I obtained of this species, sent me by 8ir E. 

 C. Buck, C.8., and taken by himself near Narkunda, late in June, 

 out of a nest containing two eggs and two young ones, was a nearly 

 perfect, rather long oval, and precisely the same type of egg as 

 those of T. erytlirocephalum. and T. cacJiinnans, but considerably 

 smaller than the former. The ground-colour is a pale, rather dingy 

 greenish blue, and it is blotched, spotted, and speckled, almost ex- 

 clusively at the larger end, and even there not very thickly, with 

 reddish brown. The egg appeared to have but little gloss. Other 

 eggs subsequently obtained by myself were very similar, but slightly 

 larger and rather more thickly and boldly blotched, the majority of 

 the markings being still at the large end. 



The colour of the markings varies a good deal : a liver-red is 

 perhaps the most common, but yellowish brown, pale purple, pur- 

 plish red, and brownish red also occur. Here and there an egg is 

 met with almost entirely devoid of markings, with perhaps only 

 one modei'ately large spot and a dozen specks, and these so deep 

 a red as to be all but black. 



The eggs vary from 1-07 to 1'15 in length, and from 0*76 to 0-82 

 in breadth. 



91. Trochalopterum simile, Hume. The Western Variegated 

 Laughing- Thrush . 



Trochalopterum simile, Hume; Hume, Cat. no. 418 bis. 



Messrs. Cock and Marshall write from Murree : — " The nidifi- 

 cation of this Trochalopterum was apparently unknown before. A¥e 

 found one nest on the 15th June, about twenty feet up a spruce- 

 fir at the extremity of the bough. Nest deep, cup-shaped, solidly 

 built of grass, roots, and twigs ; the bird sits close. Eggs light 

 greenish blue, sparingly spotted with pale purple, the same size as 

 those of Merula castanea." 



