ROSE-COLOURED STARLING. 25 



castle. The following day these holes were cleaned out, and nest-building 

 began on the 5th. It was not until the 17th that it was ascertained for 

 certain that eggs had been laid ; but by the 14th of July the young were 

 seen migrating with their parents, and soon afterwards the birds had 

 all disappeared. The nests were described as roughly composed of small 

 sticks, little branches, straws, hay, grasses, and other dry herbs -disposed 

 in a shapeless mass, with a limited hollow space in the middle to contain 

 the eggs, and irregularly lined with herbaceous fibres, leaves, mosses, and 

 feathers. The males went out to feed in small parties, returning together. 



The Rose-coloured Starling arrives in India early in August, and appears 

 in some districts in such numbers as to be injurious to the crops of white 

 " Jowaree," and before it leaves in spring it feeds on the fruit of the mul- 

 berry. During the cold season it eats insects of various kinds, the seeds 

 of grasses and plants, and any kind of fruit it can obtain. 



The eggs of this bird vary from five to seven in number, and are so 

 pale a grey in colour as to be scarcely distinguishable from white ; they 

 are very fine-grained, smooth, and glossy, and vary in length from T15 to 

 T07 inch, and in breadth from '83 to *8 inch. 



The male Rose-coloured Starling is a very conspicuous bird, with the 

 head, neck and breast, wings and wing-coverts, axillaries, tail, upper and 

 under tail-coverts, and thighs glossy black, the head, neck, and breast 

 with purple reflections, and the wings and tail with green reflections, the 

 rest of the upper and underparts being a delicate rose or salmon-colour. 

 Beak rose-coloured, dark at the base ; legs, feet, and claws dull brown ; 

 irides rich brown. The female is everywhere duller in colour. This bird 

 only moults once in the year, in autumn, when almost every feather is 

 margined with pale brown, so that the whole bird looks brown, with black 

 wings and tail. The breeding-plumage is assumed by casting the brown 

 margins of the feathers. Young in first plumage are very similar to adults 

 in autumn, but have paler wings and tail, and are without the concealed 

 black or rose-coloured bases to the feathers ; they are very similar to the 

 young of the Common Starling, but arc much paler in colour. The adult 

 plumage is assumed in the first September by a moult. 



Three species belonging to the subfamily Icterinae have been known 

 to visit this country. This subfamily is intermediate between the Sturnin^e 

 and the Fringillinse, and is strictly confined to the American continent. 

 Of the first of these, the Red-winged Starling or Red-winged Oriole 

 (Ageheus phceniceus) , nearly a dozen examples have occurred in the British 

 Islands ; but as it is a very common cage-bird, it is probable that most of 

 them had escaped from confinement. This species appears to be found 

 throughout North America as far north as the Great Slave Lake. In the 

 south it is a resident, but in the north it is a migratory bird, and it is 



