G32 Dr. C. B. Ticehurst on [Tbls, 



met with it in November. I failed to find it in the lesser hills, 

 such as the Soorjana, though like alboniger it may occur quite 

 low down in the higher hills. It is presumably resident. 



(Enanthe alboniger (Hume). 



Hume^s (;hat is confined to the higher hills of the 

 Khirthar ; the most easily accessible place is in the lime- 

 stone hills at Laki (2000 ft.), which here abut on the Indus 

 and N.W. Raihvay. I visited these hills on 9 February and 

 2 March. The nullahs here have a dried-up water-course 

 and scattered bushes and trees manage to exist; the sides 

 are steep, boulder-strewn slopes, the tops of which meet the 

 sheer cliff-faces, and here, where the largest rocks broken off 

 from the cliff have come to rest at the top of the slopes, is 

 the home of this bird. It is not common, a pair being met 

 with about every mile ; sometimes one may see them lower 

 down the slopes, but always on the largest rocks, and I have 

 seen them nearly as low down as the water-course and only a 

 few hundred feet above the level of the plains. No abundance 

 of bird-life is found in these rugged hills — a few Crag- 

 Martins, small flocks of Striated Buntings, a few Sec See, 

 and odd Redstarts and Red-tailed (.hats make up about the 

 total, and odd pairs of Hume's Chat seem to enhance the 

 desolation. 



From the state of the organs of those obtained in March I 

 should say they would breed early in April. Close to where 

 I found two pairs I found apparently two old nests, identical 

 in construction and situation. They were placed in weather- 

 worn cups in the face of huge limestone rocks lying on the 

 slopes and some 20 feet up from the boulder's base. They 

 were composed of a twig foundation, the outside of which 

 was well plastered with mud into which chips of limestone 

 were incorporated ; the lining was soft grass. The nests had 

 been used for roosts. 



This Chat is I believe strictly resident, probably never 

 leaving the gorge it breeds in ; its habits resemble those of 

 p'lcata. In the lower hills such as the Soorjana and lower 

 hills round Karachi it does not occur. 



