THE ISLANDS OP THE BAY OF BENGAL. 219 



Towards the exterior of the nest a good deal of green moss, a 

 number of satiny-white cocoons, and a little bright ferruginous 

 fern root has been incorporated in the nest, and the whole care- 

 fully coated, though not thickly so, with gossamer threads, aud 

 spider's webs, and the cavity of the nest is neatly lined with 

 black hair-like moss roots. 



The eggs were three in number, very similar to those of 

 M. azurea ; but perhaps more strongly marked ; in shape they 

 are regular, broad ovals ; the shell is smooth and fine, and has 

 a faint gloss ; the ground color varies from pinky to creamy 

 white, and towards the large end there is a broad, irregular zone 

 of red, or brownish red specks or spots ; in some eggs very minute 

 and closely set, in another larger, and less numerous, surrounded, 

 more or less with a pinkish halo ; here and there a few tiny spots 

 or clouds of lilac may be detected amongst the other markings of 

 the zone ; outside the zone tiny specks, few and far between, 

 diversify the rest of the surface of the egg. 



In length the eggs measured 0*67 and - 68, and in breadth 

 0-52 and 0*53. 



297.— Alseonax latirostris, Raffles. (6.) 



We found this species on both the Great and Little Cocos at 

 the extreme north of the Andaman group, and again on the 

 Jolly Boys, at Macpherson's Straits on the south. Captain 

 Wirnberlejr obtained it in the immediate vicinity of Port Blair. 

 Lord Walden, who has recently examined specimens from the 

 Andamans, says that they are not to be distinguished from 

 Malaccan, Malabar, Lake Baikal, Japanese and Chinese speci- 

 mens. I can add that they are not to be distinguished from 

 specimens from Ceylon, Mangalore, the immediate neighbourhood 

 of Madras, Ahmednuggur, and various localities in the lower 

 Himalayan ranges from Darjeeling to Murree. 



I have figured this bird Lahore to Yarkand, Plate V, but the 

 plate represents the upper surface, as too green and too little 

 of an earth brown ; moreover I should add that the broad rufous 

 white edgings to the secondaries, greater and median coverts, 

 are almost entirely wanting in some birds, being only repre- 

 sented by the narrowest possible pale edging. I have been 

 unable to ascertain certainly as yet whether this is due to season 

 or age. 



The colors of the soft parts too vary somewhat. In some 

 specimens the legs, feet, and upper mandible are brown ; in 

 some black, or nearly so ; in all the gape, the inside of the 

 mouth, and lower mandible are yellow, paler and purer in some,, 



