570 
companies; it breeds also in Lower Egypt, where Wilke found 
two nests on the pyramids of Abusir and Lakara on the 26th 
and 27th of March, 1858. Each of the cavities scratched in the 
sandy surface, at a shadowy but not dark locality, contained 
three fresh eggs. 
“The eggs of the one brood are more elongated, those of the 
other more rounded; all having a very regular form, the 
greatest diameter passing through the centre and the profile 
descending the poles sometimes in a more gentle, sometimes in 
a more abrupt, elliptical curve. The length (given in French 
lines) varies between 22 (1:97) and 24 (2°13) lines, the breadth 
between 183 (1°67) and 20 (1°80); the largest specimen is 
24 (2°13) lines long and 20 (1°80) broad, the smallest, 22 (1:97) 
long and 19 (1°71) broad; the weight is 48 to 60 grains.” 
It will be observed that the dimensions of these eges corre- 
spond precisely with those of our Indian birds, so that the egg, 
figured by Bree, must necessarily have belonged to some other 
species, but it is only fair to state that it is M. Moquin 
Tandon, who furnished the figure, and not Dr. Bree, who is 
responsible for this error. 
Dr. Jerdon says, that the Indian species is found throughout 
India and Ceylon ; but I cannot find it recorded by any autho- 
rity from the latter locality. Eastward it certainly extends to 
British Burmah ; but I do not find it noted from Singapore and 
the Straits, and it probably does not extend, to the Malay 
Peninsula ; westward it has been sent from Afghanistan. 
I have already at page 226, noticed the Hon'ble F. J. Shaw’s 
apocryphal account of the breeding of this species. It is only 
explicable, as there suggested, by supposing that he intended 
to refer to Spilornis Cheela. 
