248 SYLVJIDiE. 



The eggs of this species vary somewhat in size and shape, but 

 they are typically regular rather elongated ovals, rather obtuse at 

 both ends, and often slightly compressed towards the small end. 

 The shell is fine and compact and has a slight gloss ; the ground- 

 colour is sometimes greenish white, sometimes faintly creamy. 

 The eggs are generally pretty thickly and finely speckled and 

 scratched all over, and besides the fine markings there are a greater 

 or smaller number of more or less large irregular blotches and 

 splashes, chiefly confined to the large end. These markings, large 

 and small, are brown, very variable in shade, in some eggs reddish, 

 in some chocolate, in some raw sienna, &c. Besides these primary 

 markings most eggs exhibit a number of paler subsurface secon- 

 dary markings, varying in colour from sepia to lavender or pale 

 purple ; these are mostly confined to the large end (though tiny 

 spots of the same tint occur occasionally on all parts of the egg), 

 where with the large blotches they often form a more or less con- 

 spicuous and more or less confluent but always ill-defined zone or 

 even cap. Here and there an egg absolutely wants the larger 

 blotches, but even in such cases the specklings are more crowded 

 about the large end, and these with the lilac clouds still combine 

 to indicate a sort of zone. 



The eggs I possess of this species, sent me by Mr. Doig, vary 

 from 0-71 to 0-81 in length by 0-52 to 0-59 in breadth ; but the 

 average of seven eggs is 0-72 by 055. 



388. Graminicola bengalensis, Jerd. The Large Or ass-Warbler. 



Graminicola bengalensis, Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 177. 



Drymoica bengalensis {Jerd.), Hume, Rough Draft N. fy E. no. 542. 



Long ago the late Colonel Tytler gave me the following note on 

 this species : — " I shot these birds at Dacca in 1852, and sent a 

 description and a drawing of them to Mr. Blyth. They were named 

 after my esteemed friend Jules Verreaux, of Paris. They are not 

 uncommon at Dacca in grass-jungle. I think the bird Dr. Jerdon 

 gives in his ' Birds of India' as Graminicola bengalensis, Jerdon, 

 No. 542, p. 177, vol. ii., is meant for this species. The genus 

 Graminicola, under which he places this bird, appears to be a genus 

 of Dr. Jerdon's own, for it is not in Gray's ' Genera and Subgenera 

 of Birds in the British Museum,' printed in 1855. If it is the same 

 bird as Dr. Jerdon's, then my name, which I communicated in 

 1851-52 not only to Mr. Blyth but also to Prince Bonaparte and 

 M. Jules Verreaux, and which was published in my Fauna of Dacca, 

 has, it seems to me, the priority." 



The birds are identical. Jerdon gave me one of his Cachar 

 specimens, and I compared it with Tytler's types, and certainly 

 Tytler's name was published ten years before Jerdon's (vide Ann. 

 & Mag. Nat. Hist., Sept. 1854, p. 176) ; but no description was 

 published, and I fear therefore that the name given by Colonel 

 Tytler cannot be maintained, unless indeed, which I have been 



