490 NOTES, CHIEFLY OOLOGICAL, 



Subsequently, my overseer found another flock breeding 

 on a bank, and bought me a few eggs, and a bird shot off the 

 nest. Fishermen from Pamban and Ramesvaram had eaten most 

 of the eggs. The birds procured by Captain Legge at Trin- 

 comalie, in abraded plumage, were probably Terns that had 

 left Adam's Bridge after the fishermen had destroyed their 

 eggs. 



988 bis.— Sterna sinensis, Gm. 



June {Adams Bridge). — There were several nests of this 

 Tern on various banks. They were barely above high-water 

 mark ; one was below it. Two of the birds settled on the nests 

 while I was near. The mean dimensions of 20 eggs are 

 1*2 l"x 0*94." I observed all the birds carefully, but saw no 

 S. saundersi. 



989.— Sterna bergii, Licht. 



June {Adam's Bridge) . — Four nests of this Tern were among 

 those of the Roseate Tern. They were depressions in the sand 

 from 5 to 6 inches in diameter, aud 1 to 1^ inches deep, without 

 any lining. One contained a partly incubated egg, off which 

 I shot the bird ; the eggs of the others were turned out of the 

 nests, and more or less broken. In two nests two eggs 

 appeared to have been laid. The mean dimensions of three 

 eggs are 2*39" xl'64." 



The Terns were wilder than any others seen, and flew high, 

 occasionally leaving the bank aud again returning. They 

 cawed at times like Crows (C. macrorhynclia) , but commonly 

 their cry was a hoarse croak. 



Sterna ? species. 



Adam's Bridge. — When I had reached the end of my tether, 

 and was about to return, a pair of Terns came over from a 

 bank fully a mile away, and attacked me quite as savagely as 

 S. caspia. I think, therefore, it may safely be concluded that 

 they had a nest on their bank. Through a stupid blunder of 

 my servants my stock of cartridges ran out, and I was unable 

 to procure a specimen ; but I paid particular attention to the 

 birds as they came near my head. So far as I could observe, 

 they closely resemble S. dougalli in colour, shape, size, and 

 mode of flight, the rosy tint being absent, or at any rate imper- 

 ceptible, with the exception that the forehead and lores were 

 white. The legs and feet were bright orange red, and the bill 

 appeared to be much the same, but not prominently so. On 

 sending my overseer to the other banks a few days later, I 

 gave him special instructions to carefully examine the bank from 



