180 TIMALIIDjE. 



tail about 110 to 115 mm. ; tarsus about 31 ram. ; culmen about 

 17 mm. 



Distribution. Hills south of the Brahmaputra, Manipur, 

 Lushai and Chin Hills. 



Nidification. This Laughing-Thrush breeds throughout its 

 range between 3,000 and 8,000 feet, making a deep, compact, 

 cup-shaped nest of leaves, roots, bamboo leaves and grass, and 

 always with more or fewer tendrils and a little moss. The lining 

 is of roots and moss roots or fern-rachides, and the inner cup 

 usually measures about 4 in. x 2-75 in. or less and the outer about 

 6 in. x 5 in. Most nests are placed close to the ground in dense 

 tangles of creepers and vines or thick bushes, but they sometimes 

 select higher bushes or small saplings for nesting purposes. Eggs 

 maybe found from May to July. These are either two or three in 

 number and are a pale unspotted blue with a soft satiny texture, 

 almost glossless though intensely smooth. 100 eggs average 

 26-0x19-2 mm. 



Habits. This is not a gregarious bird and I have generally seen 

 it in pairs only, nor is it as noisy as most of its relations though 

 it has some quite sweet conversational and call-notes. It keeps 

 almost entirely to thick undergrowth of forests or to the ground 

 itself in bracken and brambles. Those I examined had fed on 

 insects only, chiefly a small grasshopper and a very odoriferous 

 little bug, but, doubtless they also eat seeds. They are found 

 up to 8,000 feet or over and never descend below some 3,000 feet. 



Trochalopterum lineatum. 



Key to Subspecies, 



A. Head and mantle ashy with dusky streaks. 

 . Lower plumage rufescent. 



a'. Grey margins to feathers narrow . . T.I. lineatum, -p. 180. 



b'. Grey margins to feathers broad T.I. yriseicentior , p. 181. 



b. Lower plumage paler and more grey. 



c'. Ear-coverts chestnut T.I. gilgit, p. 182. 



d 1 . Ear-coverts pale rusty T.I. ziamtensis, p. 182. 



B. Head aud mantle reddish brown with 



glistening black shaft-stripes T.I. imbricatum, p. 183. 



(171) Trochalopterum lineatum lineatum. 

 THE NEPALESE STREAKED LAUGHING-THRUSH. 



Cindosoma lineatum Vigors, P. Z. S., 1831, p. 56 (Nepal). 

 Trochalopterum lineatum. Blanf. & Gates, i, p. 101. 



Vernacular names. None recorded. 



Description. Forehead, crown, nape and mantle dark ashy 

 streaked with dusky, the shafts black; lower back and wing- 

 coverts reddish brown, the shafts white ; rump and upper tail- 



