78 CRATEEOPODIDjE. 



C. griseus are met with, but running the one into the other, while 

 intermediate forms between this species and C. somervillii (Sykes) 

 are also met with. 



Mr. Davison remarks : " This bird seems to be very irregular 

 in its time of breeding. I have taken the nest in May, June, 

 October, and December. The nest is rather a loose structure of 

 dry grass and leaves, lined with fine dry grass ; it is generally 

 placed in the middle of some thick thorny bush, and cannot gene- 

 rally be got at without paying the penalty of well scratched hands. 

 The eggs, generally five in number, are of a very deep blue with a 

 tinge of green, but of not so decided a tinge as in the eggs of 

 M. griseus. It breeds on the slopes of the Nilghiris, not ascending 

 to more than about 6000 feet." 



Mr. Wait, writing from Coonoor, says : " C. malabaricus builds 

 a cup-shaped nest in small trees and bushes, and lays from three 

 to five very round oval verditer-blue eggs." 



Captain Horace Terry says of this species : " Bather rare at 

 Pulungi, but very common lower down on the slopes and in the 

 Pittur valley. I got a nest on April 5th at Pulungi with three 

 incubated eggs, and on the 6th one with two incubated eggs, in 

 the Pittur valley. The last was built in a hollow in the top of a 

 stump of a tree that had been broken off some ten feet from the 

 ground." 



Mr. I. Macpherson writes from Mysore: "This bird is occasion- 

 ally found with C. griseus in the bigger scrub forests, but its chief 

 habitat is the larger forests. Its breeding-season is much the same 

 as C. griseus, but unlike it, it does not select thorny bushes for 

 building in, its nests being generally found in small trees or 

 bamboo-clumps. Four is the usual number of eggs laid, but five are 

 often found, and the fifth I expect is frequently that of H. varius." 



Three eggs sent me by Mr. Carter from Coonoor, in the Nilghi- 

 ries, are absolutely undistinguishable from those of Argya malcolmi. 

 Like these they are a uniform, rather deep greenish blue, devoid 

 of spots or markings, and very glossy. I do not think that, if the 

 eggs of A. malcolmi, C. malabaricus, and C. terricolor were once 

 mixed, it would be possible to separate them with certainty. Other 

 eggs taken by Mr. Davison are similar but slightly smaller, and, 

 taking them as a whole, I think they average rather darker than 

 those of the two species just mentioned. 



The eggs vary in length from 0'93 to 1*02, and in breadth from 

 0*71 to 0-82 ; but the average of nine eggs is 0-97 by nearly 0-77. 



111. Crateropus griseus (Grin.). The White-headed Babbler. 



Malacocercus griseus (Gm.\ Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 60; Hume, Rough 

 Draft N. $ E. no. 433. 



I should say thnt the White-headed Babbler breeds all over the 

 plain country of Southern India, not ascending the hills to any 

 great elevation. At the same time, many people would very likely 



