THE BIRDS OF NORTH C A CHAR. 7 



did, I do not think T should ever have found it. This nest contained 

 three callow young of a day or two old, so was left as little disturbed 

 as possible. 



The eggs, as far as I know, are never pure-white as Murray states 

 (" Avifauna of British India," Vol. II, p. 222), but have a white ground, 

 and are freckled with specks, stragglv and irregular bloches (always 

 very small) and short lines of pale greyish-pink or pale brown, some so 

 light as to be scarcely visible, whilst none are of a very dark colour. 

 In one clutch and one egg of another clutch these markings are fairly 

 numerous and rather dark, but in the rest they are very scanty and 

 feebly defined ; in one pair almost obsolete. In shape they are broad, 

 obtuse ovals, very little compressed towards the smaller end. The 

 texture is fine, close and smooth, but has no gloss, and the shell, as 

 with all the eggs of this genus, is extremely thin and fragile. Those 

 eggs which I have measured were as follows :— 



First clutch taken 5th May, '51" X -39" and '52" X -39". 



Second „ „ 12th „ -54" X •41"r53" X -41" and •53"x-41". 



Third „ „ 18th „ '56" X '43"; '54" X -42" and -54" X '42". 



A nest with an addled egg and two young was brought to me on 

 May 11th, another containing three young on May 12th, and on this 

 date I found the nest containing the three young ones. On the 7th 

 I found a nest containing three eggs on the point of hatching. This 

 bird is by no means common ; still a few are seen every year, 

 and, about Hungrum, it is fairly numerous during the breeding 

 season. 



(357) jEthopyga dabryi.— Dabry's Sun-bird. 

 Hume^ No. 227 Bis. ; Oates, No. 889. 



Hume was probably quite correct in his identification of this bird 

 in Manipur, for I have found it not very rare on the higher ranges to 

 the east bordering on that state. 



The females are very difficult to identify, but I think I identified 

 a nest rightly as belonging to this species, a female of which was 

 caught on the nest. It was taken on the 7th May, 1891, and, as seems 

 usually to be the case with nests of this genus, was attached to a fern 

 frond growing in evergreen forest. The eggs, three in number and 

 fairly fresh, were like those of yjEtliopyga gouldice, but the markings 



