42 Messrs. La Tcuche and Rickett on the 



We have nothing to add to what La Touche has already 

 written on the breeding of this species in the mountains, 

 except to note that the nests vary a good deal in con- 

 struction. Some are neat firm cups, others loosely and 

 untidily built ; some, again, are mere pads, whilst others 

 are a massive collection of materials with only a slight 

 hollow for the eggs. 



Copsychus saularis (Linn.). 



A very common resident on the plains. It seems to 

 prefer the neighbourhood of human habitations. About 

 Ching Fung Ling we rarely met with it, but when we did, 

 we invariably found some dwelling near at hand, though 

 sometimes merely a lonely farmhouse hidden among the 

 scrub on a hill-side. 



Breeding commences in April, and two, or perhaps three, 

 broods are reared in the season. The nest is placed in a 

 hole in a tree or wall or on the ground under a stone or 

 stump. Rickett took one that had been built in a rolled-up 

 sun-blind in a verandah. The materials used are fine twigs, 

 dry grass, moss, roots, hair, pine-needles, and occasionally a 

 feather or two. These are put together in a loose untidy 

 manner, and often form a mere pad. 



The eggs are pale blue, thickly speckled, spotted, and 

 blotched with reddish brown and violet, the latter forming 

 sometimes surface, as well as underlying, markings. 



Twenty-eight eggs average - 87 x *68 in. There are five in 

 a full clutch. 



Merula mandarina (Bp.). 



A very common resident on the plains, frequenting 

 gardens and copses, and, like the Magpie-Robin [Copsychus 

 saularis), always to be found in the vicinity of human 

 dwellings. 



The nest is placed high up in some tall pine or other 

 big tree. It is built on one of the large boughs in a fork 

 near the extremity of a branch, or in the angle formed by 

 one branch with another or with the trunk. 



The materials used are fine twigs, straw, dry grass, moss, 

 roots, dead leaves, and a variety of odds and ends, such as 



