1875.] MR. W. V. LEGGE ON THE BIRDS OF CEYLON, 3795 
shell-fragments. In places these gravelly shell-wastes are worked 
into little mounds and hollows by the feet of cattle driven along 
the shore of the Léways to their feeding-grounds, In these spots I 
invariably found the 42. cantianus nesting. On the top of a little 
mound 6 inches high there would be a small hollow worked out and 
bottomed with a number of little shell-fragments, just large enough 
to contain three eggs. This was the general number of eggs, and 
was never exceeded ; in some I found two, and in others, where the 
clutch was incomplete, only one. The eggs I procured were not all 
of the same type, differing both as regards ground-colour and cha- 
racter of marking. As a rule the ground was olive-grey, covered in 
some instances nearly uniformly with small irregular blots of dark 
sepia over indistinct spots of bluish grey, with here and there streaks 
and pencillings of a deeper hue; in others, of the same ground, 
the markings were most numerous at the obtuse end and the egg co- 
vered with longer streaks and scratches. A larger type than this was 
stone-yellow, with the markings consisting almost entirely of streaked 
blotches and zigzag pencillings of rich sepia*. The largest measured 
1°24 inch by 0°91, and the smallest 1-2 by 0-86. My eggs were 
all taken between the 27th of June and 14th of July, and were in 
most instances far advanced in incubation, besides which a fair pro- 
portion of nestlings were observed, showing the early part of the 
former month to be the commencement of the breeding-season. All 
the old birds had already lost the black frontal band, which I had 
found perfect in birds shot the previous year in the same district as 
early as the 17th of March, thus reducing the breeding-dress to a 
duration of only four months. 
The plumage of the nestling (which I found running along the sand 
with the parent birds) is fulvous above, with black lines and spot- 
tings on the crown and nape, and a velvety black streak down the 
centre of the back, on either side of this streak the back is marked 
with black spots ; tail black ; the nuchal markings sweep round below 
the ears in a circle; beneath the down is white ; bill black; legs and 
feet sickly olive-green. 
The various devices resorted to by the old birds to attract attention 
and draw away the intruder from the nests were most interesting to 
witness. They consisted in the bird flying off to the right hand in 
front and then circling away across me to the left and making a cir- 
cuit in rear until it came round to where it rose; this movement it 
would perform uttering the ordinary note, “ chit-ek,’’  vhit-ck.” 
On alighting it would run off, supplementing this sound with a short 
whistle ; and if successful in inducing me to follow it, it would squat 
on the ground for a moment and continue off with a low harsh cry. 
Were, however, its powers of persuasion not sufficient to draw me 
away in pursuit of it, it would rise and make the same circuit as be- 
*I should have been disposed to take these for the eges of di. mongolicus ; 
but I never could detect any other species in proximity to the nest but ZE. can- 
tianus, whose actions and deportment on the approach of nan could not be 
mistaken. I will not, however, undertake to pronounce positively that they 
were not the eggs of the former bird. 
