MTIOPHONEUS. 121 



nest is always admirably adapted to surrounding conditions. 

 Safety is always sought either in inaccessibility or concealment. 

 Built on a rock in the midst of a roaring' torrent, not the smallest 

 attempt at concealment is made ; the nest lies open to the gaze of 

 every living thing, and the materials are not even so chosen as to 

 harmonize with the colour of the site. But if an easily accessible 

 sloping mossy bank, ever bejewelled with the spray of some little 

 cascade, be the spot selected, the nest is so worked into and coated 

 with moss as to be absolutely invisible if looked at from below, and 

 the place is usually so chosen that it cannot well be looked at, at 

 all closely, from above. 



Captain Unwin sent me an unusually beautiful specimen of the 

 nest of this species, taken early in May in the Agrore Valley a 

 massive and perfect cup, with a cavity of 5 inches in diameter and 

 3 inches deep ; the sides fully 2 inches thick ; an almost solid mass 

 of fine roots (the finest towards the interior) externally inter- 

 mingled with moss, so as to form, to all appearance, an integral 

 portion of the mossy bank on which it was placed. In the bottom 

 of the nest were interwoven a number of dead leaves, and the 

 whole interior was thinly lined with very fine grass-roots and moss. 

 In this case the nest had been placed on a tiny natural platform 

 and was a complete cup ; but in another nest, also sent by Captain 

 Unwin, the cup, having been placed on the slope of a bank, wanted 

 (and this is the more common type) the inner one-third altogether, 

 the place of which was supplied by the bank-moss in situ. In this 

 case, although the cavity was only of the same size as that above 

 described, the outer face of the nest was fully 6 inches high, and 

 the wall of the nest between 3 and 3| inches thick. The former 

 contained three much incubated, the latter four nearly fresh eggs. 



A nest from Darjeeling which was taken on the 28th July, at an 

 elevation of about 3500 feet, from under a rock which partly over- 

 hung a stream, and contained two fresh eggs, was composed in 

 almost equal proportions of fine moss-roots and dead leaves with 

 scarcely a trace of moss. In this case the nest was entirely con- 

 cealed from view, and no necessity, therefore, existed for coating 

 it externally with green moss to prevent its attracting attention. 



Dr. Jerdon remarks : " I have had its nest and eggs brought 

 me (at Darjeeling) ; the nest is a solid mass of moss, mixed with 

 earth and roots, of large size, and placed (as I was informed) under 

 an overhanging rock near a mountain-stream. The eggs were 

 three in number, and dull green, thickly overlaid with reddish 

 specks." 



44 In Kumaon," writes Mr. R. Thompson, " they breed from May 

 to July, along all the smaller hill-streams, from 1500 up to about 

 4.")" i feet. In the cold season it descends quite to the plains I 

 mean the Sub-Himalayan plains. The nest is generally more or 

 less circular, 5 or 6 inches in diameter, composed of moss and mud 

 clinging to the roots of small aquatic plants or of the moss, and 

 lined with fine roots and sometimes hair. A deep well-watered 

 glen is usually chosen, and the nest is placed in some cleft or 



