8 JOURNAL, BOMB A Y NA TUBAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. IX. 



blotches and freckles; the primary ones are generally a pale rufous 

 pink, whilst the secondary are either pale lavender or pale dull purplish. 

 In some eggs the primary, in others the secondary, markings predomi- 

 nate, and the eggs take their general tint from the most numerous. 

 In a few eggs the rufous marks are quite absent, and in some others 

 they are inclined to a brownish tinge. The majority of the eggs have 

 the spots, of both colours, sparingly scattered over the whole surface 

 rather more numerously towards the larger end. In only a few eggs 

 do the spots tend to form a ring, and then always quite at the end of 

 the larger half and not one-third of the way down the egg. I have 

 one or two clutches of eggs which in general appearance are quite 

 dark rufescent-pink, the freckles being very numerous and close together. 

 Another clutch in my collection is quite the opposite ; the primary 

 marks are obsolete and over the ground-colour, which is very pale ; there 

 are merely a few rather large blotches of pale purplish, and here and 

 there a dot of brownish-red. 



Many clutches are very much like eggs of Lanius lahtora as far as 

 coloration is concerned, and others again are somewhat like eggs of 

 Dendrocitta frontalis. 



In shape they are rather long or ordinary oval — considerably com- 

 pressed towards the small end, the actual end itself however being 

 generally rather blunt. The eggs, as a rule, have no gloss, but a few 

 of the darker-tinted ones have it just sufficiently to be perceptible if the 

 egg is turned from side to side. These eggs are, however, in a very 

 small minority. The texture is coarser than is the case with the eggs 

 of any other of the Dicruridce, and the shell is fairly strong. In 1891 

 thirty-eight eggs were taken, and these and twelve more in the years 

 1887 and 1888 average 1*17" by '85". The greatest length amongst 

 that number is 1*24" and the greatest breadth - 88" ; the least both ways 

 is 1-09" and -78". 



(133) Being a eemifek. — The Lesser Eacket- tailed Drongo. 



Oates, No. 339 ; Hume^ No. 283. 



The majority of the eggs I possess of this species have a very dark 

 ground-colour, and, typically, they are far darker eggs than those of any 

 other of the Dicruridce. The bird is very common here from the level 

 of the plains up to about three thousand feet, being most plentiful in 



