186 SPOLIA ZEYLANICA. 
Habits —Frequents rushy ponds and swamps, hunting for 
food on floating lily leaves or amongst the vegetation in 
swamps. It occasionally wanders up-country. The nest is 
the usual pad of weeds or grass placed either on floating 
weeds, or amongst the herbage in swampy ground. The eggs 
three to five in number, measure about 1:2 by °84, and are of 
creamy white streaked and spotted with reddish-brown and 
pale inky purple. 
AMAURORNIS PH@NICURUS (Blanford, Vol. IV., p. 173). 
ERYTHRA PH@NICURA (Legge, p. 786). 
The White-breasted Water Hen. 
(Plate I., fig. 2.) 
Description.—Upper plumage and sides of body slaty black 
tinged with olive; forehead, sides of face, and lower parts 
from chin to breast white ; abdomen rufescent darkening to 
chestnut on the vent and under tail coverts. 
In young birds the forehead, crown, and upper parts are 
olive-brown, and the white feathers of the lower parts have 
dusky tips. 
Bill greenish, red at the base ; iris brown or brownish-red ; 
legs olive-yellow. 
Length 12; wing 6°25; tail 2°5; tarsus 2°25; bill from ~ 
gape 1-5. Females slightly smaller. 
Distribution —Abundant in the neighbourhood of water 
all over the low-country and up to about 2,000 or 3,000 feet. 
Ranges through India and Burma and the greater part of the 
Oriental region. 
Habits —This bird with its loud ery must be familiar to 
most people in Ceylon. It often wanders some way from 
water to feed in the open, but it makes a bee-line for cover 
at a sharp run whenever disturbed. The nest is a large pad 
of rushes, grass, or leaves, sometimes on floating clumps of 
vegetation, sometimes on swampy ground, or occasionally in 
bushes or reeds a little away above the surface of the water. 
The eggs are four to seven in number, elongated ovals, obtuse 
at both ends. They are creamy, white in colour with pale 
