192 ZOOLOGICAL RKSEARCHES 



nest. They begin always by tying together the forks of 

 a twicr as to make the aperture, after which they buikl 

 on just in the same way as a stocking is knitted. The 

 nest is very neatly lined with leaves and the cup with 

 some soft , dry grass. Each nest contains two , more sel- 

 dom three pale green eggs , sparingly stipped with brown. 

 Length of the eggs 2,3 cm., width 1,6 cm. Collected in 

 October. 



Hy pliant or nis c ast an e ofu sea. 



Floceus castaneofuscus , Less. Rev. Zool. 1840, p. 99. 



Hyphantornis castaneo/uscus , Hartl. Orn. W. Afr. p. 126. 



Hab. West Africa, from the Casamanze to the Gaboon. 



Collected at Bavia (St. Paul's) and at Robertsport. 



Iris yellow , bill black , feet flesh-color. 



As this species is identical with the foregoing in its 

 habits, much more cannot be said about that matter. It 

 is just as common as H. textor, keeps close to human 

 habitations and was never found in the forest. Colonies 

 of this bird apparently prefer lower positions for breeding 

 and are not seldom met in the vast reed-jungles where 

 the nests are very strongly tied to the tops of one or 

 two canes. They seem to be very particular in the selec- 

 tion of a new breeding-place, as the following observation 

 will show. 



In December 1881 my attention was called one evening 

 to an unusual noise in a not very high tree close to my 

 hunting station at Robertsport. There was a great num- 

 ber of H. castaneofusca , flying ofi* and coming back again 

 and examining very minutely the whole tree, and all that 

 with a tremendous noise. They were » talking palaver", 

 as my boys told me on asking for the reason. Early in 

 the morning of the next day, a whole cloud of the same 

 birds came on and took , with a deafening noise , posses- 

 sion of the tree , where they immediately began building 

 their hanging nests. As one of those reed-fields was close 



Notes from the l-ieyden IMuseum, Vol. VH. 



