188 



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 had a 

 slight 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." 



According to Mr. Morgan (Ibis, 1875, p. 315) the nest " is composed of small twigs, pieces 

 of grass and leaves, and is lined with the down of thistles and silk cotton. It is generally adorned 

 with the excrement of caterpillars, small bits of rag, paper, &c. A pair that built in front of 

 my office at Kurnool, in an acacia tree, had the most extraordinary nest I have ever seen. It 

 was ornamented with bits of blotting-paper, twine, and old service stamps that had been left 

 lying about. The whole structure was most compactly bound together with cobwebs, and had a 

 long string of caterpillar-excrement wound round it. It breeds from February to June, the 

 majority of the nests being constructed in March and April. The eggs are thickly spotted with 

 dusky brown on a greenish grey ground, the usual number being three." 



From Mr. Hume's exhaustive article upon this subject (Nests and Eggs Ind. B. p. 151), we 

 may glean that it breeds at very different periods in different localities : — in Central Daub mostly 

 from February to April, in Jhansie and Saugur from May to August ; and at Agra he has taken 

 nests in June, and in Hansee in July. They breed all over the plains of India, and up to the 

 summits of the Xeilgherries and up to 5000 feet in the Himalayas. They certainly have two 

 broods in rapid succession, usually in the same nest, and possibly more. They will build almost 

 anywhere, in and about gardens, and in the verandahs of houses, in clumps of acacia trees, 

 especially where these overhang water, and far away in the jungle, or in the cane-brakes of the 

 Terai. The nests are generally suspended from the fine terminal twig of some branch or the 

 frond of a cane. 



The nest is composed of all kinds of materials beautifully woven together with the silkiest 



fibres ; and cobwebs, hair, fine grass, pieces of decayed wood, lichens, rags, thorns, &c. are all 



employed. The body of the nest is oval, generally with all sorts of little pendent pieces of 



wood &c. hanging below, while the apex of the oval is prolonged into a cone, meeting the point 



of support. A little above the centre of the oval a small circular aperture is worked ; and just 



above it a projecting cornice, 1 to 1^ inch wide, is extended ; then on the opposite side of the 



oval the wall of the nest is pushed out or bulged out a little so as to give room for the sitting 



bird's tail. The bulging-out of the back of the nest is one of the last portions of the work ; and 



the female may be seen going in and out, trying the fit, over and over again. When sitting, the 



little head is just peeping out of the hole under the awning. This awning is not always present ; 



for, according to Mr. F. R Blewitt, out of eighteen nests collected by him only seven or eight 



had it ; and he adds, " I venture to state that this awning is only added when the nest is about 



perpendicular in position, and when, therefore, a necessity exists for this additional protection 



lor the entrance. I am the more particular to note this fact, because every nest with the awning 



was, when discovered, in a perpendicular position ; while those I saw without it were so attached 



as to stand out a little slantingly, and had the entrance on what may be called the underside." 



