8 JGUkNALi 60MB AY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, 1892. 



Bill black, irides dull crimson or reddish°brown ; the legs vary 

 ttiucli between borny-brown and dark plumbeous^ in a few specimens 

 being almost black. 



Male, length 8' 4** ; tail 3*4*; wing 3'9'' ; tarsus '72*; bill at front- 

 "G" and from gape 'QS*. 



Female, length S'l"; tail 3-2^ ; wing 3- 8**. 



NiDincATioN. — The nest is a rather deep cup dOtnpOsed outwardly 

 of grass stems and dead Ifeaves, and lined with edarse grass stems. 



The general appearance of the nest is a bright tan-brown and it 

 looks as if made of " kus-kus" or some similar material. Occasion- 

 ally the whole nest is constructed entirely of grass stems, but at other 

 times a good many bamboo leaves are used as well as coarse grasses 

 and a few fine twigsj and, in one nest, I also found a few fern roots 

 and a scrap or two of moss. It is a very comjjact, strongly built 

 nest; externally they average about 3*5* by 2*5/ and inwardly the 

 diameter is about 3''^ or rathef less, and the depth from I'G*' to '2'\ The 

 nest is almost invariably placed close to the ground, generally at about 

 three or four feet from itj and never, to my knowledge, abote five feet; 

 Most of my nests were taken from wild lemon trees growing at a 

 place over 6,000 feet high, but I have found one nest below 2,300 

 feet, and have seen many birds at abolit that elevation during the 

 breeding season^ All the nests were taken from scrub jungle with 

 one exception, and that one was found almost on the ground by a 

 hill path passing through forest. This last nest was very beauti- 

 fully hidden in an overhanging bunch t>f creepers being half sup- 

 ported by them and half by a bunch of coarse grass. I should never 

 have found it but for the assistance of the parent birds, who kept 

 hovering about and swearing loudly whenever I approached too close. 



My eggs are all of one type j the ground-colouf a lovel}'' pale pink, 

 covered with numerous spots and freckles of pinky-red which are 

 slightly more numerous at the larger enda 



I have one or two eggs of 0. flamventris which resemble them in 

 all but size, and a clutch of eggs of Spizixos danifrons which are quite 

 undistinguishable from them. 



The average size of twelve eggs is '93'^ X '71'^i 



The gresltest and least length is "96" and "SS", and the greatest 

 and least breadth "73"' and '69". ■ • 



