262 SCHOSNICOLA PLATYURUS. 



2. Lower down on the same 

 page he remarks : " Looked at 

 in a good light, the whole back 

 and upper tail-coverts are 

 cross-rayed, the bars being at 

 narrower intervals than on the 

 tail/' 



3. P. 211, he says : " The 

 tail feathers are not pale tipped 

 as in some Locusiellas." 



2. In my specimens the tail 

 is cross-barred, but the back 

 and upper tail-coverts are per- 

 fectly plain, and show no signs 

 of cross-rays in any light. 



3. In all of my specimens 

 the tail feathers are conspicu- 

 ously pale tipped on the lower 

 surface. 



" On the same and following page it is noted by Mr. Bour- 

 dillon, ' that the birds he shot on the 17th April in the 

 Assamboo Hills were obviouslv breeding, although he failed to 

 discover a nest/ This seems strange as the birds were then 

 in the dark, rufeseent brown, cold weather plumage, whereas 

 they breed in the pale bleached summer plumage about Belgaum 

 in September for certain, as I found two or three nests myself 

 this year in that month, one of which contained four eggs, 

 and I saw several other pairs of birds at the same time, all 

 of which were breeding beyond a doubt. The bird may pos- 

 sibly breed twice a year, viz. in April and again in September. 

 In this there is nothing very remarkable, but it is a fact worthy 

 of note if it breeds in the dark cold weather plumage as well 

 as in the pale summer plumage/' 



I cannot myself consider the breeding in April as by any 

 means established as yet. The females examined by Mr. Bour- 

 dillon showed no traces, his brother writes to me, of this, and 

 in some species the testes of the males begin to enlarge months 

 before they actually breed. 



Lastly, Captain Butler sent me for the new edition of " Nests 

 and Eggs" a note on the nidification of this species, which I 

 think is sufficiently important to be published at once. He 

 says : — 



" On the 1st September 1880, 1 shot a pair of these birds as 

 they rose out of some long grass by the side of a rice field ; and, 

 thinking there might be a nest, I commenced a diligent search, 

 which resulted in my finding one. It consisted of a good sized 

 ball of coarse blades of dry grass with an entrauce on one side, 

 and was built in long grass about a foot from the ground. 

 Though it was apparently finished, there were unfortunately no 

 eggs, but dissection of the hen proved that she would have laid 

 in a day or two. On the 10th instant, I found another nest 

 exactly similar, built in a tussock of coarse grass, near the same 

 place ; but this was subsequently deserted without the bird lay- 

 ing. On the 19th September, I went in the early morning to 



