SCOPS. 107 



palm (Caryota urens). A few leaves or grass-stalks usually line 

 the hole in which the eggs are deposited." 



The eggs are pure white, glossy, and very spherical as a rule, 

 though they vary a good deal in shape, some being slightly elon- 

 gated and some slightly pyriform. In size they vary greatly; 

 in length from 1-13 to 1-38 'inch, and in breadth from O95 to 1-18 : 

 but the average of forty-eight eggs is 1/25 by 1*05 inch, or precisely 

 the same as the average of Carine brama. 



Scops malabaricus, Jerd. Jerdon's Scops-Oivl. 

 Scops malabaricus, Jerd., Hume, Cat. no. 75 quat. 



Mr. G-. Tidal remarks : " The Malabar Scops is common in the 

 north of the Ratnagiri district, but less so, as far as my present 

 experience goes, in the south. It is entirely nocturnal, but its 

 low, subdued call after nightfall easily betrays its haunts. I 

 have found it in holes of trees, in houses, and in nooks in dry 

 wells. 



" All the nests, six in number, I have found were got in January 

 and February, in holes of mango- and jack-trees. Three appears 

 to be the maximum number of eggs. In two instances two hard- 

 set eggs were found. Xone of the nests contained any lining but 

 rotten touchwood. One nest within ten feet of the ground con- 

 tained three hard-set eggs, on which the female was sitting. The 

 male, who was caught in a similar hole in an adjoining tree, made 

 no attempt whatever to claw or bite, but submitted to his fate with 

 great meekness. The eggs are in shape and size almost exactly 

 similar to those of Carine brama, but they are decidedly more 

 glossy and have a more creamy tinge. The average dimensions of 

 seven eggs measured were 1*34 by 1'13." 



The eggs of all these Scops-Owls are undistinguishable. With a 

 large series, one finds that in one species they average a little 

 larger, and in another a little smaller, but single eggs of few of 

 them are recognizably distinct. Those of the present species are 

 the usual pure white, fairly glossy, very broad ovals. 



Scops lempiji (Horsf.). Horsfield's Scops-Owl. 

 Scops lempiji (Horsf. ), Hume, Cat. no. 75 quint. 



Major C. T. Bingham thus writes of this Owl in Tenasserim : 

 " Common in the Thoungyeen valley. I have myself neither 

 seen nor heard it anywhere else. 



" The call of this bird is peculiar for a Scops, it is a long rolling 

 hur-r-r-r, continued for minutes together. On the llth March a 

 Karen, who had been marking down nests for me in the Meplay 

 valley, took me to a tree on the bank of the choung, and showed 

 me a hole in the branch of a large pyma-tree (Lay erst roemia flos- 

 reyincK), in which he said a small Owl had its nest with three eggs. 



