PELLOENETTM. 101 



I found a nest on the ground near Pegu. A good many bamboo- 

 leaves had fallen and the nest was imbedded in these. It was 

 formed entirely of these leaves loosely put together, the interior 

 only being sparingly lined with fine grass. The structure in situ 

 was tolerably firm, but it would not stand removal. In height it 

 was about 7 inches, and in breadth about 5, the longer axis being 

 vertical. Shape cylindrical with rounded top. Entrance 2| inches 

 by 1§, placed about the centre. The interior of the nest was a 

 rough sphere of 4 inches diameter. 



" There were three eggs, slightly incubated. The ground-colour 

 is pure white, and the whole surface is minutely and thickly 

 speckled with reddish-brown and greyish-purple spots, more closely 

 placed at the thick end, where they coalesce in places and form 

 bold patches. 



" On the 29th June, I found another nest of similar construc- 

 tion, placed on the ground in thick forest, at the root of a shrub." 

 Mr. W. Davison in 1875 gave me the following note : — " On the 

 morning of the 25th March I took at Bankasoon a nest of this 

 species in thick forest ; it was placed on the ground and was com- 

 posed externally of dead leaves, with a scanty lining of fine roots 

 and fibres. It measured externally about 5 inches high by about 

 4 wide. The egg-cavity was hardly 3 inches in diameter. The 

 nest was only partially domed, and was very loosely and carelessly 

 put together. 



" The nest contained three eggs, but these were so far incubated 

 that it was impossible to Wow two of them." 



The single egg of this species obtained by Mr. Davison is in 

 shape a moderately broad oval, a little pointed towards the small 

 end ; the shell is fine, but has little gloss. The ground-colour, so 

 far as this is visible through the thickly-set markings, is white, 

 and it is very finely but densely stippled and freckled (most densely 

 at the large end, where the markings are not unfrequently con- 

 fluent or nearly so) with dull to bright reddish brown ; here and 

 there, especially about the large end, more or less faint grey or red 

 specks, spots, or tiny clouds may be traced underlying as it were 

 the brown or purplish markings. 



The egg sent me from Pegu by Mr. Oates is of precisely the 

 same size and type, but the markings are much less dense and are 

 brighter coloured, The ground-colour is white, and the egg is 

 pretty thickly speckled with a reddish-chocolate brown. Here and 

 there a moderately large irregularly-shaped spot is intermingled 

 with the finer specklings. The markings are rather most dense 

 at the large end, where there is a tendency to form a zone, and 

 here a number of pale purplish-grey streaks and specks are also 

 intermingled. 



Major C. T. Bingham says : — " Early on the morning of the 7th 

 April, moving camp from the sources of the Thoungyeen, on the 

 side of a hill at the foot of a bamboo-bush not two feet from the 

 road, I flushed and shot a female of the above species off her nest ; 

 a little loosely-put-together round ball of dry bamboo-leaves, un- 



