PYCUONOTUS. 191 



" The nest was found on the 25th May, and contained three eggs 

 slightly incubated. The ground-colour is a fresh pink, but with 

 little gloss. The whole egg is covered with a profusion of dark 

 purplish-red spots, more thickly disposed at the thick end, but 

 everywhere frequent. In addition there are some underlying and 

 much paler smears. The three eggs measured respectively -75, "78, 

 and -77 in length, by -63, -62, and -61 in breadth. 



" Subsequently I found five other nests, from the 1st April to 

 the 20th June, all similar to the one described. Eggs invariably 

 three. Average size of twelve eggs - 82 by "6." 



The nests ot this species that I have seen have been very slight 

 flimsy structures, nearly hemispherical cups, composed of fine 

 twigs and the leaf-stalks of pennated leaves a little bound together 

 with cobwebs and thinly lined with fine hair-like grass. In some 

 cases a leaf or two has been attached to the outer surface to aid 

 the concealment of the nest. The nest is very loosely woven just 

 like a sieve, as a rule nowhere more than - 25 inch thick, and with 

 a truly hemispherical cavity, diameter about 2-5, depth about 1-25. 



The eggs are of the ordinary Bulbul type, but not amongst the 

 more richly-coloured examples of these; in shape and size they 

 vary a good deal, but typically they seem to be moderately broad 

 ovals slightly compressed towards the small end. The shell is fine 

 and smooth, but has scarcely any appreciable gloss; the ground is 

 pale pink or pinky white. At the large end the markings are 

 dense, forming in some eggs an almost confluent zone, in others a 

 mottled cap ; they consist of irregular-shaped spots and specks of 

 deep red and pale subsurface-looking greyish purple ; over the rest 

 of the surface of the egg outside the zone or cap the markings are 

 much smaller in size and much more thinly scattered, and it is 

 observable that the secondary purple markings are to a great extent 

 confined to the zone or cap, as the case may be, and its immediate 

 neighbourhood. 



Occasionally the markings, which seem always to be small and 

 speckly, are very sparsely set, leaving comparatively large portions 

 of the surface unmarked; and occasionally eggs are met with in 

 which the primary markings are wholly wanting, and there is 

 nothing but a pale reddish-purple cloudy mottling over the greater 

 portion of the surface of the egg.* 



* Pvcnonotcs plumosus, Bl. The Large Olive Bulbul. 

 Ixus plumosus (BL), Hume, Cat. no. 452 sept. 



Mr. W. Davison writes : — " I found one nest of this Bulbul at Kossoom : it 

 was of the ordinary Bulbul type and placed in a small but dense elump of cane, 

 about 18 inches from the ground. The parent birds were very vociferous when 

 the nest was approached." 



The eggs of all these Bulbuls, though they are separable nhen individually 

 compared, follow so closely tbe same type of colouriug that it is almost impossible 

 to make their distinctions apparent by any verbal descriptions. 



The eggs of the present species are like those of so many others, moderately 

 broad ovals, obtuse at the large end, somewhat compressed towards the small 



