PETEOPHILA. 105 



small spots confluent over them), usually darker towards the larger 

 end." 



Major "Wardlaw Eamsay says, writing of Afghanistan: "It 

 was, I think, breeding in June." 



The eggs appear to vary little in size or shape. They are rather 

 long ovals, very blunt at the small end, and having a slight gloss. 

 In colour and character they recall the eggs of Stoparola and 

 Niltava. Looked at from a distance the general hue of the egg is 

 either a pale brownish pink or a dingy buff, darkest towards the 

 large end. Closely looked into, the general tint proves to result 

 from a pinkish-white ground very closely and minutely freckled 

 and mottled all over (but most densely at the large end) with pale, 

 dingv brownish, salmon-colour, or reddish brown ; the colour, in- 

 deed, is so ill-defined that it is difficult to say what it is. The 

 eggs have a slight gloss. They vary in length from 0-87 to 0-99 

 inch, and in breadth from 0*68 to 0'79 ; but the average of twenty 

 eggs is a little over 0-92 by 0'72. 



693. Petrophila cyana (Linn.). The Western Blue 

 Hock-Thrush. 



Petrocossyphus cyaneus (Linn.), Jerd. B. 2nd. i, p. 511. 

 Cyanocincla * cyanus (Linn.), Hume, Rough Draft N. 8f E. no. 351. 



Colonel C. H. T. Marshall, writing from Murree, remarks : 

 " The eggs of the Blue Rock-Thrush have not, we think, been re- 

 corded before from India. There is a description of them in 

 Sharpe and Dresser's ' Birds of Europe/ We found the nest in a 

 low stone wall at no great elevation ; it contained four eggs, very 

 pale blue, with a few small brown specks on them. The eggs are 

 1-1 inch in length and 0'75 inch in breadth, and were taken early 

 in June." 



One of these eggs, sent me by Colonel Marshall, is excessively 

 small for the size of the bird, very much smaller than the egg of 

 M. saxatilis, but there is, I think, no possible doubt of its authen- 

 ticity, and it corresponds fairly with eggs collected in Greece by 

 Dr. Kriiper on the 8th June, J862. The egg is very smooth and 

 has a fine gloss. The ground-colour is an excessively pale, slightly 

 greenish, blue, and it is pretty closely speckled at the large end 

 with very minute brownish-red spots ; a few similar specks are 

 sparsely scattered over the rest of the surface of the egg. It was 

 taken on the 7th June, and measures 1 by 0*73 inch. Two other 

 eggs subsequently taken at Murree measured 1*15 and 1-1 in 

 length by O78 and O75 in breadth. 



Major Wardlaw Eamsay says, writing of Afghanistan : "A few 



* In the Rough Draft, Mr. Hume proposed the generic term Cyanocincla 

 for this species and P. solitaria. These two birds, however, appear to me to 

 be congeneric with PefropJiita cinchrhyn^ho , the type of the genus Fetrophilo 

 Eo. 



