30 INDIAN DfCKS. 



and, kiokino- into the bole, t'onnd ;>ixteeii <'g^>^ which exiictly matched the 

 one taken from the body of the bird. They were lying on a bed of twigs 

 and quill-feathers of some large bird, with a little lining of down and 

 .some fragments of snake skin. The hole was about five feet from the 

 ground, and about two feet deep, the entrance being about nine inches 

 wide by about six dee[). The hole went into the bank ijuite hori- 

 zontally, and there was nothing in the way of a ledge to alight on at 

 the entrance, so that the bird must have })0}i})ed in as a pigeon does. 

 Such a feat fully justifies the opinion^ that the (Jomb-Duck is not a 

 clumsy bird." 



The number of eggs laid seems to vary very much, but probably a 

 dozen or less is about the normal number, though Mr. Anderson seems to 

 have had from fifteen to twenty brought to him not infrequently, and on 

 one occasion found the enormous number of forty eggs, of which thirty- 

 nine were normal and one under-sized. He captured a female on this 

 nest, and says that she was in an emaciated condition, and therefore, he 

 believed, authoress of the whole forty eggs. 



Probably a wild bird, with no extraneous aid in the way of artificial 

 food, (kc, would be a great deal exhausted after such an effort, but a 

 domestic hen would not think it anything out of the way, nor would she 

 be any the worse for it. 



Hume's forty-five eggs varied from 2"2'2 to 2'^j8 inches in length, and 

 in breadth: between 1-6.") and I'li^. averaging 2'41 x 1*72. The little clutch 

 found by Mr. Anderson, excluding the abnormally small one, averaged 

 2^ X If inches, giving an average for the whole eighty-four of 2"45 X 1'74 

 almost. 



Jerdon says that the Nukhtas breed in July or August "" in grass by 

 the side of tanks, laying six to eight whitish eggs.'' Jerdon did not, 

 however, know, nor did he care much about, the oological part of 

 ornithology ; and 1 do not think much weight need be attached, as a rule, 

 to what he says about nidification. 



The breeding-time, nearly all over India, varies from the end of June 

 to the beginning of September, and probably much depends on when the 

 rains commence. Here, in Assam, where the rains, like the poor, are 

 always with us, I think the birds begin to breed in the end, or even in the 

 beginning of June. In Bengal they commence to breed in early July : 

 in the north-west in the late July or August, sometimes as late as 

 September. In Burmah they seem to breed in the two first-mentioned 

 months, and in Ceylon alone they alter their habits and are said to breed 



