244 STLVIID^. 



nests was 7 inches long by 3 wide, and one of the cup-shaped nests 

 was nearly 4 inches in diameter and stood, perhaps, at most 

 2| inches high. The egg-cavity in the different nests varies from 

 If to 2i inches in diameter, and. from less than 2 to fully 3 inches 

 in depth. Externally the nest is very loosely and, generally, 

 raggedly constructed of very fine grass-stems and tow-like vegetable 

 fibre used in different proportions in different nests ; those in which 

 grass is chiefly used being most ragged and straggling, and those 

 in which most vegetable fibre has been made use of being neatest 

 and most compact. In all the nests that I have seen the egg-cavity 

 has been lined with something very soft. In many of the nests the 

 lining is composed of small felt-like pieces of some dull salmon- 

 coloured fungus, with which the whole interior is closely plastered ; 

 in others there is a dense lining of soft silky vegetable down ; and 

 in others the down and fungus are mingled. They lay from four 

 to five eggs, never more than this latter number according to my 

 experience. 



" At the end. of June 1867," writes Mr. Brooks, " I took two 

 nests of this bird at Chunar in low ber bushes about 2 feet from 

 the ground. They were little spheres of fine grass with a hole at 

 the side. One contained four eggs ; these were of a greyish-white 

 ground or nearly pure white, finely speckled over with reddish 

 brown, some of the eggs exhibiting a tendency to form a zone 

 round the large end, and others with a complete zone." 



" At Sambhur," Mr. Adam says, " this Wren-Warbler is always 

 found wherever there are low bushes. It breeds just before the 

 rains, but I have not recorded the date. I had a nest with the 

 bird and five eggs sent to me. The eggs are pale bluish white, 

 with reddish- brown spots and freckles all over them." 



" During July, August, and the early part of September," re- 

 marks Mr. W. Blewitt, " I found a great number of the nests and 

 eggs of this bird in the jungle-preserves of Hansie and its neigh- 

 bourhood. The nests, of which I have already sent you several, 

 were mostly in ber (Zizyphus jujuba) and hinse {Oapparis aphylla) 

 bushes, at heights of from 3 to 4 feet from the ground. Five was 

 the largest number of eggs that I found in any one nest." 



Major C. T. Bingham remarks : — " I found several nests of this 

 bird in the beginning of October at Delhi in the jherberry bushes 

 so plentiful on the Ridge. Both nests and eggs are very like those 

 of Cisticola cursitans before described ; the only difference I could 

 find was that the entrance in the nest of G. cursitans that I found 

 was at the top, and in all the nests of F. bucJianani at the side 

 rather low down ; the nests of the latter are also firmer and more 

 globular in shape. The eggs are, to my eye, identical in colour 

 and form." 



Mr. G-. Beid informs us that at Lucknow it is fairly common 

 and a permanent resident. It makes an oblong, loosely constructed 

 nest with the aperture near the top, and lays three or four white 

 eggs minutely spotted with dingy red. 



Mr. J. Davidson writes that in Western Khandeish this Warbler 



