lEENA. 159 



reminding one much of the nest of Graucalus niacii and not in the 

 smallest degree of that of an Oriole. A mere pad, some 4 inches 

 in diameter, composed of very thin twigs or dry flower-stalks with 

 a couple of dead leaves intermingled, and an external coating of 

 green moss. 



Major C. T. Bingham has favoured me with the following notes 

 from Tenasserim : — " At the sources of the Winsaw stream, a 

 feeder of the Thoungyeen river, on the 30th April I found a nest 

 of this bird, a mere irregularly roundish pad of moss with very httle 

 depression in the centre, containing t\\o fresh eggs, and placed 

 12 feet or so above the ground in the fork of an evergreen sapling. 

 The eggs measure 1-18 x 0-86 and 1-19 x 0-86 respectively, and are 

 so thickly spotted and blotched with, brown as to show veiy little 

 of the ground-colour, which latter, however, appears to be of a 

 greenish white. 



" On the 11th April I was slowly clambering along a very steep 

 hill-side overlooking the Queebaw choung, a small tributary of the 

 Meplay stream , when from a tree whose crown was below my feet 

 I startled a female Irena pueVa off her nest. I could see the nest 

 and that it contained two eggs, so I shot the female, who had 

 taken to a tree a little above me. On getting the nest down, I 

 found it a poor affair of little twigs, with a superstructure of moss, 

 shaped into a shallow saucer, on which reposed two eggs, large for 

 the size of the bird, of a dull grenish white, much dashed, speckled, 

 and spotted with brown. Tliey were so hard-set that I only 

 managed to save one, which measured 1*09 by 0'77 inch." 



Mr. Davison writes : — " At Kussoom, in some moderately thin 

 tree-jungle I found the nest oi Irena imella. The nest was placed 

 in the fork of a sapling some 12 feet from the groimd. The nest 

 externally Avas composed of dry tvAigs, carelessly and irregularly 

 put together. The egg-ca\dty was shallow, not more than 1*5 inch 

 at its deepest pai-t, and it was lined with finer twigs, fern-roots, 

 and some yellowish fibre. The nest contained two fresh eggs." 



Two eggs, taken by Mr. Davison at Kussoom in the north of 

 the Malay Peninsula, to which the Malayan form does not extend, 

 are rather elongated ovals, with a slightly pyriform tendency. 

 The shell is fine, smooth, and compact, and has a perceptible gloss. 

 The ground-colour is greenish white ; round the large end is a 

 huge, smudgy, irregular zone of reddish brown and inky grey, the 

 one colour predominating in the one egg, the other in the other. 

 Inside the zone are specks and spots of the same colours, and below 

 the zone streaks and spots of these same colours, thinly set, stretched 

 downwards towards the small end of the egg. 



Other eggs subsequently received are very similar to that first 

 sent by Mr. Bourdillon, except that in shape they are more 

 regular ovals, and that the brown markings in some have a reddish 

 and in some a purplish tinge, and that in some eggs the mottings 

 and markings are pretty thick even at the small end. 



In length they seem to vary from 1'08 to 1-2 inch and in breadth 

 from 0-73 to 0-88 inch. 



In some eggs the ground appears to have no green tinge, but is 



