NECTARININ^E. 371 



This species is perhaps the widest-spread of all of the Indian Ho- 

 ney-suckers. It is found throughout India, in many districts being 

 the only one seen : viz., through the greater part of the West of 

 Central India, the N. W. provinces, and Slndh. It is also found 

 in Ceylon and N. Burmah. It ascends to the top of the Neil- 

 gherries, 7,500 feet, but I did not see it at any great height on the 

 Himalayas. Blyth believes that, at Calcutta, both sexes put on the 

 bright livery of the nuptial season ; but in the south of India the 

 female does not, I think, do this. I had a pair breeding at my door 

 at Jalna, and saw the female daily in her usual dull costume. Lay- 

 ard, too, distinctly implies the same, in his account of the bird in 

 Ceylon. This bird, like the others of its tribe, has a feeble but sweet 

 chirping note.* It feeds partly on the nectar of flowers, but 

 a good deal on insects, small cicadellge, flies, spiders, &c. It occa- 

 sionally hovers in the air before a flower whilst extracting the 

 honey, but generally hops about and clings to the smaller twigs and 

 flowering branches. I have occasionally seen it snap at an insect in 

 the air. Wliilst feeding it frequently opens and closes its wings. 



I have seen its nest several times. On the occasion above 

 alluded to, a pair built their nest just outside my house-door at 

 Jalna. It was commenced on a thick spider's web, by attaching to it 

 various fragments of paper, cloth, straw, grass, and other substances 

 till it had secured a firm hold of the twig to which the spider's 

 web adhered, and the nest suspended on this was then completed 

 by adding other fragments of the same materials. The entrance was 

 at one side near the top, and has a slightly projecting roof or awning 

 over it. The female laid two eggs of a greenish-grey tinge, with 

 dusky spots. The first nest was accidentally destroyed after 

 the eggs were laid, and the couple immediately commenced 

 building another in a small tree at the other side of the door, and 

 in this instance, as in the last, commenced their operations on a 

 fragment of spider's web. They reared two young ones from this 

 second nest. 



The eggs have been described by another naturalist as greyish- 

 white, speckled and ringed with cineritious-grcy. Tickell describes 



* Much resembling the song of Phylloscopus trochilus, accordiug to Blyth. 



