OBIOLUS. 361 



adjoining tree there was a nest with two slightly-set eggs. He 

 says : — " It was a very deep cup on the end of a thin branch, and 

 though in cutting the branch to get at the nest, it got turned at 

 I'ight angles to its proper position, the eggs were uninjured. I do 

 not think this nest belonged to the same pair as that which had 

 young ones flying. 



" These Orioles are very common here, and I found three nests ; 

 one was new and empty ; from another the birds had just flown ; 

 while the remaining one contained one fresh egg. The bird would 

 no doubt have laid more ; but to get at the nest I had to cut the 

 branch off, aud it was only then I discovered that only one egg 

 had been laid." 



Major C. T. Bingham says : — " Plentiful at Allahabad across 

 the Ganges, notwithstanding which I only found one nest, and 

 that I have no note about, but I remember it was some time in 

 June, and contained four half-fledged young ones ; the materials 

 of the nest were the same as those used by 0. hcndoo." 



Writing of his experience in Tenasserim he adds : — " On the 

 5th March I found a nest of this bird in a small tree near the 

 village of Hpamee. It, however, contained three unfledged young, 

 so I left it alone. 



" On the 21st April I found a second nest suspended from the 

 tip of a bamboo that overhung the path from Shwaobah village to 

 Hpamee. This contained two awfully hard-set eggs, white, with 

 a few dark purple blotches and spots at the larger ends. Nest 

 made of grass and dry bamboo-leaves, Hned with the dry midribs 

 of leaves, and firmly bound on to the fork of the bamboo with a 

 strip of some bark." 



Mr. Gates writes from Pegu: — "My nests of this Oriole have 

 been found in March, April, and May, but I have no doubt they 

 also breed in June. No details appear necessary." 



Typically the eggs are somewhat elongated ovals, only slightly 

 compressed towards one end, but pyriform as well as more pointed 

 varieties may be met with. The sheU is vei-y fine and moderately 

 glossy. The ground-colour varies from a creamy or pinky white to 

 a decided but very pale salmon-colour. They are sparingly spotted 

 and streaked with dark brown and pale inky purple. In most 

 eggs the markings are more numerous to\^ards the large end. 

 Some have no markings elsewhere. The dark spots, especially 

 towards the large end, are not unfrequently more or less enveloped 

 in a reddish-pink nimbus. Though much larger and much more 

 glossy, some of the eggs, so far as shape, colour, and markings go, 

 exactly resemble some of the eggs of Dicrurus ater. The eggs of 

 0. Tcundoo are typically excessively glossy china-white, with few 

 well-defined black spots. The eggs of 0. mela)iocep7ialus are 

 typically somewhat less glossy, with a pinky ground and more 

 numerous and less defined brownish-purple spots and streaks. I 

 have not yet seen one egg of either species that could be mistaken 

 for one of the other, although of course abnormal varieties of each 

 approach each other more closely than do the typical forms. 



