PLOCEUS. 119 



I add tlie following notes, however, as they throw light on some 

 disputed points. 



Colonel Butler writes : — " The Common Weaver-bird breeds 

 abundantly in the neigh bourhoed of Deesa during the rains, com- 

 mencing to build its elaborate nest, which takes about a month to 

 complete, about the middle of July. There are two nests as a rule 

 for each pair, one with a long tubular entrance for the hen, in 

 which the eggs are laid, the other without this tubular passage and 

 open at the bottom, with a perch of woven grass across the lower 

 edge for the cock bird to sit in. I have constantly found only two 

 or three, often four or five, and once as many as nine, but I am 

 inclined to think that when more than three or four are laid in 

 one nest, more than one hen bird assists in laying. I once found 

 a nest containing elevirn fresh eggs. I can offer no solution as to 

 the mud question ; to all appearances it looks most useless and 

 unmeaning." 



Mr. Benjamin Aitken remarks : — " The first nest I ever took of 

 the Common Weaver-bird contained four young ones. This was 

 at Satara, in the Deccan. Two, of course, is the almost invariable 

 number of eggs laid." 



The eggs of this species, like those of all the others of this 

 group with which I am acquainted, are of a pure, dead, glossless 

 white. They vary a good deal in size and shape, but are typically 

 rather long ovals, a good deal pointed towards the small end. 

 Long ovals pointed at both ends and blunt pyriform varieties are 

 common. 



The eggs vary in length from 0-72 to 0-9, and frojn 0-52 to 0-G2 

 in breadth ; but the average of forty eggs is 0-82 by 0"59. 



721. Ploceus megarhynchus, Hume. The Eastern Bcnja. 



Ploceus baya, BL, Hume, Cat. no. 694 his. 

 Ploceus megarhynchus, Huive, t. c. no. G94 ter. 



The Eastern Baya breeds from Sikhim down to Tenasserim from 

 April to September. 



Mr. Gates makes the following general remarks on the nidifl- 

 cation of this Baya in Pegu: — "The breeding-season commences 

 in April, and from ten to fifty pairs of birds nest in company. 

 They either select the eaves of a thatched building, frequently 

 nesting inside the verandah itself, or the pendent branches of a 

 thorny tree. In this latter case they seem to prefer a tree the 

 branches of which grow over the water. The eggs are two or 

 three in number and pure white." 



Mr. J. E,. Cripps, writing from Eastern Bengal, says : — " Ex- 

 cessively common, and a permanent resident, very destructive to 

 the paddy-crops when in the ear. In the cold weather the males 

 drop the yellow crown. Builds in all kinds of trees and at various 

 heights from the ground. It breeds from May to August. I ha\e 

 on several occasions found a second nest commenced from the 



