birds' nesting on the '^eastern narra." 373 



hollow scraped in the ground is nearly always situated on a bare 

 piece of " Jculler'" or salt ground, sometimes under a small 

 bunch of grass, at others under a dry bramble, or at times right 

 out in the open without any attempt at concealment. The size 

 of the eggs varies from 1-10 to 1*20 in length and from -75 

 to '85 in breadth, the average of 12 eggs being 1-13 in leno-th 

 and '80 in width. 



(2.) 443.— Laticilla burnesi. 



This bird is in certain localities very numerous, but invari- 

 ably confines itself to dense thickets of reed and tamarisk 

 jungle. The discovery of my first nest was as follows : — 



On the 13th March, while closely searching some thick o-rass 

 along the banks of a small canal, I heard a peculiar twitterino- 

 which I did not recognise. After standing perfectly still for a 

 short while, I at length caught sight of the bird which I at 

 once identified as L. hurnesi. Leaving the bed of the caaal 

 in which I was walking and making a slight detour, Icame sud- 

 denly over the spoil bank of the canal, on to the place where 

 the bird had been calling. My sudden appearance caused the 

 bird to get very excited, and it kept on twittering, approachino- 

 me at one time until quite close, and then going away acrain a 

 short distance. I at once began searching for its nest, and out 

 of the first tussock of grass I touched, close to where I was 

 standing, flew the female who joined her mate, after which both 

 birds kept up a continuous and angry twittering. On openino- 

 out the grass I found the nest with three fresh eggs in it, 

 placed right in the centre of the tuft and close to the ground. 



The eggs were of a pale green ground colour, covered with 

 large irfegnlar blotches of purplish brown, and not very unlike 

 some of the eggs of Passer flavkollis. After this I found 

 several nests, but they were all building, and were one and all 

 deserted, though in many instances I never touched the nest, 

 often never saw it, as on seeing the birds flying in and out of 

 the grass with building material in their bills, I left the place 

 and returned in ten days time, but only to find the nest de- 

 serted. In one case where a single egg had been laid, I found 

 that the bird before deserting the nest had broken the eo-o-. 

 In July I again got a nest and shot the parent birds ; the eggs 

 in this nest were quite of a difierent type, being of a very pale 

 cream ground colour, with large rusty blotches, principally con- 

 fined to the larger end. 



The nests of this bird are composed of coarse grass, the inside 

 being composed of the finer parts ; they are 4 to 5 inches 

 external diameter and 2^ inches internal diameter, the cavity 

 being about 1^ inches deep. The months in which they breed 



