40 The Oologists' Record, June i, 1922. 



lining of finer ones or tendrils. My three clutches of eggs 

 are dated October 19th and 29th, and November 28th. An 

 average egg measures 27 mm. x 20 mm. The ground colour is 

 deep greenish cream, and the medium-sized rounded rail-like 

 spots which are well sprinkled over the egg are light purplish-brown 

 and lilac. They form more or less of a cap at the blunt end. The 

 shape of the egg may be called elongate-ovate. I may add that in 

 the early spring I heard these birds utter, besides the flute-note 

 {which is very like that of Laniarius), a sort of screech and yet a 

 third sound, a clinking note like an exaggeration of a Stonechat's. 

 On that occasion there were three birds together : two males 

 pursuing a female, or, of course, it may have been vice versa. This 

 species seems to inhabit both the Highlands and the Shire Valley^ 

 as eggs have been taken at Chiromo. 



Lanius collaris, L. — Probably there is no better-known African 

 bird than the Fiscal, Butcher-bird, Bull-head, call it what you will. 

 For some reason it is rare in Nyasaland as compared with the south 

 generally, and with Kenya in the plains. You may always be 

 sure of finding a pair in its special domain, held to all through the 

 year, but you may travel a long way before you come to the next 

 pair, and, in all, I do not suppose I have seen more than a dozen 

 pairs in the parts of the Protectorate I have travelled over. I 

 have found but one nest. Coming down Lake Nyasa in H.M.S. 

 " Gwendolen," I landed one evening (November 21st, 1921) at 

 a spot of peculiar desolation called Bana, given over to reeds, deep 

 sand, biting flies, and a few intensely melancholy borassus palms. 

 I made for the only spot of any promise, where a few scrubby bushes 

 grew, and, as I approached, a Fiscal Shrike flew up from somewhere 

 and perched rather anxiously near the top of a palm. There was 

 not much choice of sites, and at the third or fourth try I came on the 

 nest, at about 8 feet from the ground, well in towards the centre of 

 a bush. It was a deep compact cup, of flexible twigs and all kinds 

 of mixed dry vegetation, with a few insect cocoons, and was lined 

 with strips of fine borassus fibre. The three fresh eggs it contained 

 were the finest clutch of this bird I ever saw ; and even now, after 

 the fading to which the Fiscal's eggs are subject more than any other 

 Shrikes, they are still very beautiful. They measure 25I mm. x 

 18 mm., and have an irregular zone of large brown and purple 

 blotches on a creamy ground. Speaking from memory they are a 

 good deal larger than Uganda eggs of this species. The Uganda 



