804 Mr. G. A. K. Marshall on 



some seated, some hovering round a spot where some 

 Karens had been eating their food, and had left some rice 

 and gnapi scattered on the ground. I was approaching 

 the butterflies cautiously to see what species were there, 

 when a small black-and-white bird came down from a tree 

 close by and perched on the ground close to one little mob 

 of butterflies busy feeding away on the gnapi. I recog- 

 nized the bird at once as the pigmy hawk (Microhicrax 

 co'TuIeseens). His coming flop down close to the butterflies 

 disturbed some, but not all. A few were too intent on 

 their meal. The hawk sat for fully two minutes looking 

 at the butterflies, then he crouched as birds do when they 

 are about to rise, and next moment with a c[uick snatch 

 he had taken a butterfly in his claws and was flying to 

 the nearest tree. Though I was watching intently I am 

 quite unable to say whether he took one of the sitting 

 butterflies or one that was flying about. I watched him 

 eat the insect, which he held with his claw against the 

 branch on which he was seated, and he tore at it just as 

 the larger hawks do with their prey. I wanted a specimen 

 of the bird, so shot it, and afterwards picked up the wings 

 of the butterfly he had eaten ; it was a PapUio sarpcdon." 



N.B, — That same specimen of Microhierctr is now, I 

 believe, in a small case by itself in the bird gallery of the 

 British Museum. 



[Colonel C. T. Bingham has also made some interesting 

 observations on the use of insects' wings as a pad at the 

 bottom of a hole in a tree, forming the nest of this same 

 species of bird, the falconet Microhicrax coerulcsccns, 

 Linn. (J/, eutolmus, Hodgs.). The following account is 

 quoted from "Stray Feathers" (vol.v. No. 2, June 1877, 

 pp. 79-81). The observations were made in the "Govern- 

 ment Teak Reserve on tlie Sinzaway Chaung, a feeder of 

 the Yoonzaleen River, which it enters about two days' 

 march below our frontier station of Pahpoon in Tenasserim." 

 The nest was found on Ajiril 14, " in a hole on the under- 

 side of a decayed bough of a mighty Pymma tree {Lagcr- 

 strmnia Flos itrginnj)." The four eggs were found to be 

 " stained by resting on the broken leaves, wings of dragon- 

 flies, and bits of wood which composed the nest." The 

 editor appends to this account a note of Davidson's which 

 had been in his possession for years. On March 25 the 

 nest of Microhicrax fringillarius, Drap., was examined. 

 It had been made in a hole in a dry tree in an old taungyah 

 (clearing) "near Bankasoon at the extreme soutli of Tenas- 



