544 ACBOCEPHALUS STENTOBIUS. 



egg which it contained at the time of my finding it was a broad oval in shape, pale green, boldly blotched 

 with blackish over spots of olive and olivaceous brown, mingled with linear markings of the same, under 

 which there were small clouds and blotches of bluish grey. The black markings were longitudinal and thickest 

 at the obtuse end. It measured 089 by 067 inch. 



In India it has as yet only been found breeding in Cashmere, and there only (at the time Mr. Hume's 

 Xests and Eggs of Indian Birds ' was published) by Captain Cock and Mr. Brooks. It breeds in May 

 and June ; and the nest is described variously as an " inverted and truncated cone," " a deep cup," and 

 "a largish nest of a deep cup form," composed of coarse water-grass or dry sedge, woven round the 

 reeds which support it about 2 feet above the water. Mr. Hume describes two types of eggs — the one 

 stippled minutely with small specks, over which are scattered bold and well-marked spots of greyish black, 

 inky purple, olive-brown,, yellowish olive, and reddish umber-brown ; in the other the stippling is almost 

 wanting, and the markings are smaller and less well defined. The average size of nine eggs was - 89 by 

 0-61 inch. 



