214 MOTACILLID.E. 



grass and roots and lined very scantily with finer roots. Three 

 eggs is the largest number I have seen in one nest. 



The breeding-season certainly extends from March to July, but 

 the three nests I have myself taken in Upper India were all found 

 in April. 



A nest of this species, taken by Mr. F. R. Blewitt at Saugor on 

 July 16th, and kindly sent to me by that gentleman, was a shallow 

 ragged saucer some 4 inches in diameter, with an egg- cavity an 

 inch deep. It was composed almost entirely of very fine brown 

 rootlets, looking for all the world like a lump of oakum, inter- 

 mingled with a few pieces of grass, and with a mere pretence for 

 a lining of fine grass-roots. The fine oakum-like rootlets were 

 fitted together so as to make the bottom and sides of the nest, 

 comparatively speaking, very firm. 



Colonel Gr. F. L. Marshall tells us that " the Indian Tit-Lark 

 breeds in the Saharunpoor District in March, the eggs being 

 hatched in the first half of April. 



" The nest is placed on the ground, under a tuft of grass or 

 against a clod in the open field. A nest taken on the 24th March 

 with three slightly-set eggs was placed against, and half under, a 

 large clod, with grass growing on it, which bending over com- 

 pletely concealed the nest ; it was cup-shaped and composed of 

 grass and grass-roots and fibre, much coarser and more strongly 

 put together than the nest of the Crested Lark. There was no 

 perceptible lining. The egg-receptacle was 2| inches in diameter 

 and nearly 2 inches deep. 



" The eggs, three in number, were of a slightly yellowish-white 

 colour, profusely and boldly spotted and blotched with yellowish 

 brown and dingy purple, the markings being most numerous 

 towards the larger end, where they exhibit a tendency to form an 

 irregular confluent cap." 



According to Mr. Hodgson's notes, this species " breeds in 

 Nepal, laying in March and April, the young ones being ready to 

 fly in June. They build their nests under the shelter of some 

 clump of grass or overhanging clod, constructing it of dry grass 

 and cow-hair, which they round into a very shallow pad-like nest. 

 They lay three or four eggs." 



Dr. Jerdon states that "it makes its nest on the ground in 

 April and May, under a slight prominence or in a tuft of grass, 

 or at the edge of a bush, and lays three or four eggs, of a greenish 

 ground-colour, with numerous small brown specks, chiefly on the 

 larger end." 



This Pipit has been found breeding by Mr. Doig in the Eastern 

 Narra districts. 



Colonel Butler writes from Deesa : "April 30th, 1876. Found 

 a nest of the Indian Tit- Lark, containing three young birds about 

 a fortnight old, so that the eggs were probably laid about the end 

 of the third week in March. The nest was placed on the ground 

 in the centre of a small tamarisk-bush growing on some hard, bare, 

 incrustated ground in the bed of the river. It was a well-built 



