26 THE BIRDS OF THE LUCKNOW CIVIL DIVISION. 
ege-shells were translucent, which gave the eggs a fleshy-white 
appearance. They measured as follows :— 
Average of four ... eee 1°14 by °86 inches. 
Smallest egg 50 ot D2? 4 ea he 
Largest ege 0s ass HELO SS ay 
197.—Xantholema hemacephala, Jill. Native 
name—Basunta. 
The Crimson-breasted Barbet is a permanent resident and 
one of our most common, as it is also one of our most brightly 
colored, birds. It feeds, like the last species, on fruit and berries 
and young and tender buds. It begins to pair in January, and 
from then to the end of May its lovd and monotonous call 
resounds in every tope, and is perhaps the most familiar heard. 
Unlike Palcornis torquatus, it invariably excavates the hole 
for its nest, and selects for that purpose either branches or trunks 
of trees internally or outwardly decayed—the former, I think, 
for choice. It generally lays two eggs—occasionally three— 
smaller of course, but of exactly the same shape and appear- 
ance as the eggs of J. caniceps. My record of nests is as 
follows :— 
March 17th ... nest and 2 eggs (fresh. ) 
“ 17th Ee ee vate hime otha 
ye 18th ae oy ee ae Caress in) 
ss 24th neu 5, 98 4,  (semi-incubated.) 
May Sth ass 9 2 young (just hatched.) 
As 21st ve , | eee Giledzed-) 
y] 
Average measurement of 6 eggs -94 by ‘67 inches. 
Measurement of largest egg ... ‘97 ,, °70  ,, 
Measurement of smallest egg ... °90 ,, “64 ,, 
199.—Cuculus canorus, Lin. 
Karly one morning about seven or eight years ago, while wan- 
dering leisurely about the ruins of the “ Bailey Guard,” I was 
agreeably surprised to hear the Cuckoo’s ‘ Wandering Voice,” 
but did not see the bird—fit visitor to such a shrine ; but I was 
more fortunate on the 29th May last, when I both heard and 
saw it in a rather forest-looking tract, in which a pineapple 
garden flourishes under the grateful shade of stately trees, and 
through which a clear rivulet runs for eight months of the 
year—a delightful spot about two miles to the north of 
Lucknow. 
Though the above record is all I know of the occurrence of 
the Cuckoo in the Division, others may have met with it oftener. 
Still, its visits like those of angels, must, I am afraid, be 
“ few and far between,” 
