The Oologists Record, December i, 1921. 91 



Several colonies were found in the middle of June, but all the 

 nests contained young birds. It is quite impossible for me to say 

 what is the size of a normal clutch, probably five or six eggs. 



NOTES FROM NYASALAND. 



I propose to confine this article to certain general considerations, 

 and shall hope to follow it with others giving a more detailed account 

 of the nests and eggs which have come under my notice. 



By the end of this year (1921) Blantyre will be connected by 

 rail with the Cape, but till now Nyasaland (formerly British Central 

 Africa) has been the most difficult of access of all the British pos- 

 sessions in Africa. Transhipping at Beira into a coasting steamer, 

 you reach, after twenty-four hours of a very troubled sea, the 

 Portuguese port of Chinde, where there is a British concession. 

 Then follows a journey, which may take the shallow-draught river 

 steamer anything from three days to a week, according to the state 

 of the river, up the Zambesi to Chindio, also Portuguese. Here one 

 boards a train which, after traversing Portuguese territory for a 

 short distance, enters the British Protectorate and arrives the same 

 evening at Blantyre. 



That a trip up the Zambesi is packed with ornithological interest 

 may well be imagined. There are many stoppages, accidental and 

 other, so that I was able on my way up (September, 1920) to do a 

 little nesting. Eggs found were those of the Red-chested Sunbird, 

 Chalcomitra guttiiralis, Mozambique Shrike, Laniariiis major mossam- 

 bicus, Spur-winged Plover, Lobivanellns lateralis, and Kittlitz' Sand 

 Plover, Charadriits variiis. The last two were at Chindio, on a 

 large sandy island in the river. Watching shore birds to their nests 

 at midday, under the white glare of a scorching African sun, is a 

 good test of interest in the hobby, I thought. 



