BRACIITPTERXUS. — TIG A. 311 



blown and fresh, snffiised with a delicate salmon-pink hne, but 

 when emptied of their contents milk-white and generally liighk 

 glossed. They remind one much of those of the Great Spotted 

 AVoodpeeker, but are always longer, though seldom broader, and 

 often slightly narrower, than the eggs of the European species. 

 One or two of the eggs I possess are precisely of the size and shape 

 of the White-rnmped Woodpecker's, as figured by Bree. They are 

 not unfrequently \'ery obtuse at both ends. 



jThe eggs vary in length from 1 to 1-2 inch, and in breadth from 

 p-77 to (J-85 inch; but the average of twenty eggs is 1-11 by 0-8 

 inch. 



Brachypternus erythronotus (Vieill.). The Red-baclced 



Woodpeclcer. 

 Brachyptermis ceylonus (Forst.), Hume, Cat. no. 182 bis. 



Colonel Legge remarks : — " In the south of Ceylon the Eed 

 Woodpecker breeds from February until June, and not unfrequently 

 nests in the trunk of a dead cocoanut-tree, cutting a round en- 

 trance and excavating the decaying part of a tree for some distance 

 below it. I have never been able to procure the eggs, although 

 the bird is so common." 



Tiga javanensis (Ljung). The Lesser Three-toed Woodj^ecl-er. 



Uhrysonotus intermedius [Blyth), Jerd. B. Ind. i, p. 299. 

 Cbrysouotus nibropjgialis {Malh.), Jerd. B. hid. \, p. 299. 

 Tiga javanensis {Ljitny), Hume, Cat. uo. 184. 

 Tiga rubropygialis {Malh.), Hume, Cat. no. 185. 



Mr. Oates, writing from Pegu, says : — " On the 7th May J. got 

 three eggs, quite fresh, from the hole of a tree. The hole appeared 

 to have been a natural cavity, but the entrance had been enlarged 

 and made circular. The nest was at no great height from the 

 ground. 



" The three eggs are pure white, and very glossy and smooth. 

 They are extremely pointed at one end. They measure 1*1 by 0-77, 

 1-07 by 0-71, and 1-09 by 0-75." 



Major C. T. Bingham records the following note from Tenas- 

 serim : — "The commonest of common Woodpeckers in the Thoun- 

 gyeen as elsewhere over the country. I subjoin a note of a nest 

 and eggs I found. It was the 22ncl March, 1879, and a frightfully 

 hot day. I was returning to camp, and my road lay through some 

 dry already burnt eng {Dipterocarpus) jungle. Passing close to a 

 small stunted p}'ma tree ( Lager strcemia jios rer/ince) a Woodpecker 

 flew out of a hole on the side nearest to me, nearly hitting my face 

 as it flew, and perched, or rather struclf, as they do, on a iree not 



