XANTHIXUS. 393 
Measurements. Total length about 205 mm.; wing 81 to 
87 mm.; tail about 100 mm.; tarsus about 20 mm.; culmen 
about 10 min, 
Distribution. Assam, South of the Brahmaputra as far East as 
the Naga Hills, Manipur, Lushai, Chin Hills and Arrakan. 
Nidification. In Assam and the Chin Hills Blyth’s Bulbul 
breeds between 3,500 and 7,000 feet in April, May and June, 
but nests and birds sent me from the Arrakan Yomas were taken 
at about 3,000 feet in February and March. 
They are forest birds, their nests being generally placed in 
quite low bushes and carefully concealed and as the bird slips out 
very silently when disturbed, the nests are hard to find. In 
shape they are shallow cups very neatly made of grass, fine twigs, 
weed stems, an odd leaf, scraps of moss or lichen and a few 
coarse roots. The lining is nearly always the flowering end of a 
coarse grass, bright tan in colour. The bush selected is always 
one in forest or thick scrub, the rare exceptions being in mixed 
scrub- and bamboo-jungle. 
They lay either two or three eggs, most often the former. 
These are typical Bulbul’s eggs but very finely freckled or stippled 
instead of blotched, and, “whilst the markings are generally 
very profuse everywhere, they are often much paler and 
pinker than they are in Molpastes. There are sometimes about 
the larger end a few short lines of darker reddish brown or 
purplish black. In shape they are long, rather blunt ovals 
with fragile, glossless shells. 100 eggs average 23°8 x 16-4 mm., 
the greatest and least lengths being 268x174 and 187x 
152mm. and the broadest and most narrow 26°8x17°4 and 
21°8x 15:0 mm. respectively. 
Habits. Blyth’s Bulbul may rarely be found in valleys of the 
higher ranges as low down as 1,500 feet but normally they are 
pirds of tlie higher hills horween 3,500 and 7,500 feet. In 
winter they frequent more open country, ae as patches of 
cultivation, light forest, bamboo- and scrub-jungle round cultiva- 
tion, open glades and light forest near streams and tracks but in 
the breeding season they retire to the deeper forests. They may 
be found in flocks of anything from half-a-dozen to over thirty and 
resent other birds feeding w ith or near them, often quarrelling 
even amongst themselves over food and other matters of interest. 
They are not noisy birds and seem to have no song, most of their 
conversational notes being much like those of the last genus. 
They feed on both insects and fruit and frequent bushes, low 
trees and high trees alike in their quest for them. 
(409) Xanthixus flavescens vividus. 
THe Muteryir BULBUL. 
Xanthizus flavescens vividus (misprint vivida) Stuart Baker, Bull. 
B. O. C., xxxvill, p. 16 (1917) (Muleyit Mt.). 
Vernacular names. Cheng-ma-kator (Kachin). 
