Egg-coUecthuj in Asia Minor. 411 



passage protruded from the centre of tlie mud nest. These 

 nests were very strongly and solidly built, and I had to hit 

 them with a stone in order to break them open ; they 

 were thickly and warmly lined with soft hair closely felted 

 together, and had all the appearance of having been used for 

 many years, as the clay of the prolonged narrow entrance- 

 passages had assumed a grey, hard, stony appearance. 



On the plain between the marsh and the mountain I found 

 another Crested Lark^s nest with five eggs, and a Turkish 

 shepherd-boy showed me a Bunting's nest, containing five 

 eggs, in a cornfield, just outside a village. This nesc was 

 Imilt right on the ground beside a stone, and the eggs much 

 resembled those of the Yellow-hammer. However, the Yellow- 

 hammer does not breed in this, or I believe in any, part of 

 Asia jNIinor, and I have no doubt that it was a nest of 

 Cretzschmar's Bunting [Emberiza casia) , a, sjiecies which is not 

 uncommon in that country. While returning to Appa along 

 the railway-line we dug out four Rock-Sparrows" nests. Tliree 

 of these were just ready for eggs, and the fourth contained 

 young birds just hatched out. These nests were all made in 

 holes that had been bored, to a depth of about four feet, into 

 the cuttings and embankments along the railway-line. Late 

 in the evening, while strolling about on the plain quite close 

 to the station-buildings, I almost trod on a Short-toed Lark 

 [Calandrella hrachydactyla) sitting on three eggs, which were 

 so much incubated that I v.'as able to blow them only with 

 great difficulty. 



Eai'ly the next morning I found another Short-toed 

 Lark's nest, also with three eggs, somewhat incubated. In 

 a village about a mile from the railway-station I found two 

 colonies of Spanish Sparrows [Passer salicicola) busy 

 building all round the sides of two Storks' nests. These 

 latter were immense structures, the accumulation of many 

 years, placed in trees some ten feet above the ground, 

 and the S[)anisli Sparrows' nests were built all round them, 

 and so close together that they filled almost every interstice 

 in the great piles of sticks. The nests were very much 

 like those of the Common Sparrow [Passer doincsticus) , loose 



