16 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXIV. 



banks at the fpot of one of the Ber bnshes. Concealment was not 

 attempted, though the masses of fallen leaves which covered the 

 ground were of mach the same colour and size as the eggs, so that 

 care in this respect was hardly necessary. Sometimes the eggs were 

 laid on the ground with no real nest other than the fallen debris 

 which had accumulated thereon, but once or twice I found that the 

 natural hollow which had been selected to receive them had been 

 wellfilled with a mass of leaves, small sticks and grass, some of 

 which must have been brought from a considerable distance. 



Higher up in the hills, in the open oak forests, the birds were 

 much more particular in selecting nesting places well screened from 

 view. In April, after the grass had all been burnt, the country 

 hereabouts much resembled an endless Jttlnglish park ; mile after mile 

 of rolling hill covered with brilliant green grass, amongst which the 

 black stems of numerous oaks stood out in vivid contrast. From 

 a distance the whole plateau looked as if natural cover was non- 

 existent, but on closer acquaintance one found tiny nullahs and 

 rivulets running between the swelling hills, each bank well covered 

 with bushes, tall reeds and brambles, amongst which the Peafowl 

 found all they wanted in the shape of protection. Here too the 

 nests were often much better made as well as better hidden. I 

 found one such which was made of a dense layer of sticks filling up 

 the base of a large natural hollow ; above this again there was a 

 well matted covering of coarse grass, whilst the foiir eggs it con- 

 tained were half buried in small leaves and finer grasses. 



I also once found a nest, from which the young had been 

 hatched, placed in a tangle of creepers and fallen rubbish on the 

 top of a low bush, but Anderson found them in even queerer places 

 than this. He writes (vide Hume) : 



" Three years ago, a chuprassy, who, from long practice had become 

 somewhat arboreal in his habits, brought me three fresh eggs from an 

 old nest of Gy2JS beugalensis. Shortly afterwards I saw the nest, which 

 was situated on a huge horizontal bough of a burgot, in the centre of 

 some dhak jungle, and on which all the Peafowl in the neighbourhood 

 were in the habit of roosting, t have every reason to believe my 

 chuprassy, because he had no object in wishing to deceive me, and my 

 own experience is in favour of these birds laying at high elevations, for 

 I have on several occasions taken their eggs from the roofs of huts in 

 deserted villages, from high mounds, and from the top of pucca onujids, 

 on which rank vegetation grew to a height of 2 or 3 feet." 



Professor Littledale, also, writing from Baroda records that there, 

 when the flat country gets flooded, the Peafowl resort to big trees 

 for nesting purposes, and he obtained three fresh eggs which had 

 been laid in a hollow formed by the bifurcation of several massive 

 branches of a Banyan tree. 

 Hume says : — 



" Canal banks fringed with trees and traversing rich cultivation are their 

 especial delight, and in such localities I have found a great many nests." 



