FROM NORTH-WEST CEYLON. 477 



or that the nests containing them are stronger than the others. 

 The bird's saliva is the only cementing material. I have 

 often watched the birds tear off the bits of bark used, and 

 carry them straight to the nest. They attach them from the 

 outside, and reverse the usual order, beginning with the inner 

 coating or lining, and afterwards fixing on the larger flakes 

 composing the outer one. The nests vary much in size and 

 position, being from one to two inches in diameter, and 

 high up or low down on any handy tree, big or little, dead or 

 living. The birds often sit on them before the egg is laid, and 

 the nests are easily found when one knows where to look for 

 them, that is, always at an " elbow/' or on a horizontal exposed 

 branch, from three-quarters of an inch to an inch and a half in 

 diameter. Many nests are destroyed, perhaps, by Crows. The 

 bird does not alight on the nest, and in some cases I believe 

 does not even touch it with her feet. She first settles on the 

 branch, and then shuffles her body forward until her breast 

 rests against the opposite wall. Sometimes one or two flakes 

 of bark are glued on the top of the branch, probably to give 

 her feet a better hold. She sits very close, and when on the 

 nest often answers the calls of her mate, who is always in the 

 immediate neighbourhood. The site is sometimes selected a 

 month or more before the construction of the nest is begun j in 

 that case one of the birds is always to be found perched at it 

 in the early morning, and often during the day also. 



Two eggs measure 0'88" X 0-64", and 0-91" X 0-62". 

 They are very pale dull creamy grey in colour, and somewhat 

 glossy, almost elliptical, but slightly compressed towards 

 the small end. They appear to be discoloured, but that is not 

 the case ; a perfectly fresh egg is of exactly the same tint as 

 a partly incubated one. 



When the nestling is partly feathered it is fed at long 

 intervals, the birds ejecting the food from the gullet, like 

 Parrots. When able to fly a little it perches near the nest, or 

 on a higher branch, occasionally preening itself, and watching 

 every movement of the old birds with the greatest interest. 

 On the close approach of one of them, however, it becomes 

 perfectly immoveable, or, as one of my men remarked, " when 

 the bird came, without speaking, it simply sat." While in the 

 nest, and even after it is as well feathered as the parents, it 

 has a weak, whistling note, very much like that of a young 

 pigeon, which it mostly utters as the old birds are flying near, 

 apparently as a mild reminder that it would like a few more 

 flies. 



111.— Caprimulgus atripennis, Jerd. 



A solitary egg in my collection measures 1*12" X 0"81". 



61 



