230' Mr. E. C. Stuart Baker on the [Ibis^ 



and on the sides of the cliff, vvitli the aid o£ which it was- 

 easy to clamber down to the nest. 



The nests themselves are^ as a rule, very large, and though 

 each year the birds seem to discard a certain amount of the 

 old material, they add a more than corresponding amount of 

 new, so that a very old nest becomes a bulky affair. One 

 of the Lailancote nests must have been nearly three feet 

 across one way by about two the other, and measured a good 

 two feet deep on the side next the cliff. In front there was- 

 a ridge of stone which, whilst it kept the nest from sliding 

 off the ledge, reduced its thickness to about a foot. Other 

 nests, though less bulky than this one, were all big sub- 

 stantial affairs, containing a large amount of material. The 

 smallest, which was built in a V-shaped crack in a rock, was 

 over a foot across the top in diameter, filling up the crevice 

 to a depth of about eighteen inches in the centre. The birds 

 use a good many pliant twigs, sometimes with the leaves still 

 adhering, as a sort of lining, but the bulk of the nest itself 

 is composed almost entirely of small sticks from one to two 

 feet in length, and about the thickness of a stout lead pencil. 

 A few shorter thicker sticks are alsp worked into the base of 

 the nest, and often old bits of rubbish, such as skins, wool^ 

 large feathers and roots are also made use of. 



Mr. P. L. Dodsworth, who took some nests of this Falcon 

 near Simla, thus describes one of them : — "The nest was a 

 loose, irregular platform of sticks, with a central depression ; 

 a few pieces of string, rope, rags, and other odds and ends 

 were mixed up in the structure." 



On another occasion, however, where he found the bird 

 breeding inside a cleft in the rocky side of a precipice, the 

 two eggs were laid on the ground without any pretence at a 

 nest of any kind, just as were those taken by Mr. Hopwood. 



The number of eggs most often laid is three, but very 

 often two eggs only are incubated ; on the other hand, 

 sometimes four are laid. 



A description of the eggs is quite unnecessary, as they 

 follow all the phases of marking found in those of the 

 Peregrine, and there is no way by which they could be 



