4 
reached, and a small hand-net must be used to get out the eggs. With practice the nests are 
easy to find. When last year I found the first nest I did not expect to discover any more. It 
was on the 16th May, as I saw a couple of Shrikes pursuing each other near an old Turkish 
burying-ground, and one flew into a moderate-sized cypress tree. I crept up with my gun, but 
could not perceive the bird anywhere; at last I threw a stone into the tree and the Shrike flew 
out. I thought there must be a nest there, which, in fact, I found, on climbing up, close to the 
trunk of the tree; it contained six quite fresh eggs. Later on I found other nests, and observed 
that none were as carefully concealed as the first one. ‘The nest is very strongly built, so much 
so that it lasts in the open air for a year or two. Round the outside of the carefully formed 
edge, the bird plaits in threads, rags, &c., which it collects. It lays six or seven eggs, and has 
two broods in the year, the first in the middle of May, and again in June, in which month I 
found most nests as I was searching in the trees for nests of Sylvia olivetorum, and in the bushes 
for those of Sylvia galactodes. | 
*“ As late as the 27th of June I found a nest with fresh eggs. In the second nest it deposits 
fewer eggs, as I found four or five, sometimes only three. ‘The eggs, of which I sent a number 
to Germany, are in size generally similar to those of Lanius rufus, but sometimes much less, and 
on a clay-coloured or whitish ground are covered with large and small spots and blotches, which 
form a ring at the larger end. Like those of other Shrikes they are subject to variation. The 
eggs of this species are easily distinguishable from those of other Shrikes.” 
Our description and figure of the adult is taken from a fine male bird in our own collection 
procured by Capt. Shelley, in Egypt, on the 8th of March, 1870, and that of the young bird from 
a Syrian specimen also in our own collection. 
In the preparation of the above article we have examined the following specimens :— 
E Mus. Sharpe and Dresser. 
a. 3. Kgypt, March 8th, 1870 (G. H. Shelley). 6.2. Egypt, April 8rd, 1853 (S. Stafford Allen). c. &. 
Palestine, May 5th, 1864 (H. B. Tristram). d, e. Syria (Verreauz). 
E Mus. Rk. B. Sharpe. 
a. Abyssinia (Verreauz). 
E Mus. Lord Lilford. 
a. 6. Smyrna, May 2nd, 1863 (Schrader and Kriiper). 6. Egypt (S. Stafford Allen). 
E Mus. H. B. Tristram. 
a, b. Nubia (A. Brehm). c,d, e. Palestine (H. B. T.). 
E Mus. Howard Saunders. 
a. Algeria (J. H. Gurney). 6. Gelamet (Jesse). c. Smyrna (Kriiper). 
