208 Mr. J. D. D. La Tonche on the 



same bird as our Fohkien species. The call of our bird is of 

 the same kind, but we syllablized it somewhat difFereutly, 

 making out the calls to resemble the following : " Cheee- 

 wichee [long pause], cheee-wichew." Our collectors called 

 it the " Chiwichee.'^ On previous occasions they collected 

 many specimens, both on the Kuatun grassland limit and in 

 another locality, some miles from Kuatun on the Kiangsi 

 frontier, which they said was lower than Kuatun. Young 

 and moulting birds were shot in October 1896. 



We obtained three nests during the last trip. Two were 

 found on the 4tli May. One of these, Chunkai told me, had 

 been discovered by a native, who, taking it to be a rat^s nest, 

 half destroyed it. Chunkai, on rediscovering it, found an 

 egg inside. He explained that the bird, being about to lay, 

 had repaired the nest, laid her egg, and then deserted it ! It 

 is more likely that the first finder did not notice that an 

 egg had already been laid. We took this nest on the 8th 

 of May; it was in a tea-field, built in a tea-bush. It had 

 originally been a domed nest, and the remains were a ragged 

 cup of bamboo-leaves wrapped up in moss. We took the 

 second nest on the 10th May. It was in the same plan- 

 tation, placed in a tea-bush, not far from a bramble-covered 

 brook that bordered a bamboo-plantation. The female was 

 sitting, but a careful manoeuvre on our jDart forced her to fly 

 out in the open and she hid in a tea-plant, when a snapshot 

 secured her without damage. The nest rested between the 

 upright twigs near the top of the plant, and was very loosely 

 fastened to these. It is a rough, domed, oval structure, 

 with side- entrance, made of bamboo-leaves and coarse grass- 

 blades, with a little fine grass and a few feathers (one of 

 these a feather of Bamhusicola thoracica) as lining. The 

 total outer length of the nest is 5 inches ; the outer diameter 

 at the base of the aperture 3 inches ; aperture about 1^ x If 

 inch; egg-cavity about 1^ inch deep; inner diameter a 

 little under 2 inches. There were four eggs, slightly incu- 

 bated. Another nest, with one incubated and two addled 

 eggs, was brought to me by a native on the 15th May. It is 

 similar to the last, even to the one feather of B. thoracica. 



