68 Lieut. R. E. Vauglian and Staff-Surg. K. H. Jones 



of harsh guttural notes, which are peculiar and characteristic, 

 without being pleasant to the ear. 



At times in the spring this Shrike can produce a variety 

 o£ notes almost amounting to a song, and it is also 

 an admirable mimic. One individual was heard to imitate 

 the Mynah, Grackle^ Magpie, Francolin, and Black- 

 headed Bulbul. Tiie Francolin and ]\Iynah are often 

 imitated, and wonderfully well. The Francolin sometimes 

 replies to the Shrike's challenge. 



This Shrike does not keep a larder, though one was 

 once observed to jab a small lizard on a spike of bamboo 

 before eating it. 



The nest is a deep well-made cup of coarse grass, 

 often with a few flowering heads outside, lined with finer 

 grasses. It may be placed in a variety of trees at eleva- 

 tions of from three to twenty feet or more. Up the West 

 River evergreens and fruit-trees are favoured, and bamboos 

 are used occasionally, but in Hong Kong the nest is often 

 in a fir-tree. 



The eggs are laid from about mid-April until well on in 

 June, and there is little doubt that this species is double- 

 brooded. Four or five is the usual clutch, but six have been 

 obtained, and on one occasion a nest was found containing 

 five eggs of the Shrike and one of the common Dove of 

 the country. 



As in the case of L. collurio, the eggs are of two A-arieties, 

 a reddish and a greenish, and the former are much the 

 rai'er on the coast ; out of forty eggs taken at Hong Kong 

 only one was red. Up the West River the red phase pre- 

 dominates. 



Eggs vary in length from 1'08 to "91 and in width from 

 •81 to -72, and average -99 x '75. 



Lanius fuscatus. 



The Black Shrike is much less common than Lanius 

 schach. It is more abundant on the coast than up the river 

 aud has not been observed at all in Kwang Si Province. 

 No less than five of these birds in various localities were 



