100 FIELD-STUDIES OF BARER BIRDS 



it must be remembered that the food supply during 

 the period of conception, and even before that, 

 might, in the case of any hen, materially affect 

 the issue. 



For their owner's size the eggs are, by com- 

 parison, perhaps the smallest of any British egg. 

 Usually they are inclined to be narrow and some- 

 what elongated ; moreover, they are comparatively 

 thin-shelled, while on many specimens curiously- 

 indented lines, and other flaws are noticeable. 

 In colour they exhibit every imaginable shade of 

 bluish-green, greenish-blue, and even bluish- or 

 greenish- white as a ground, mottled, blotched, 

 speckled, smeared, spotted, streaked, flecked, and 

 scratched with olives, browns, greens, and greys of 

 many tints, whilst occasionally almost black marks 

 occur. On the whole they are pale-looking eggs, 

 that is, showing more ground-colour than mark- 

 ings, though heavily and richly blotched examples 

 particularly one or two in a "set " do occur. 

 One type is splashed and smudged over its entire 

 surface of dirty-green with greenish-brown and 

 grey ; another possesses bold blotches of very dark 

 brown, olive, and lilac-grey on a bright bluish- 

 green ground ; a third is pale greenish -blue, 

 freckled, mottled, and streaked with greenish-ash 

 and brownish-grey ; a fourth, very pale bluish-green 

 (sometimes of so pale a tint as to look whitish), 

 sparingly flecked with rusty and yellowish -brown, 

 the underlying markings being purplish-grey. 



