BUETSTOMUS. 57 



ill cliffs near Nowshera ; though I did not take their eggs I could 

 have done so, had I wanted them. They make no nest to speak 

 of; a few dead leaves in the hole of the tree where they have laid 

 their eggs being all the nest I have ever found. 



" Breeds in the Peshawur Valley. I saw it flying about cliffs 

 during the months of April and May, and could have taken its 

 eggs had I been so inclined, but I had such large series taken in 

 Cashmere that I did not care for more. I notice the eggs are 

 larger and more glossy than the eggs of C inclica." 



Colonel Biddulph informs us that this Eoller breeds in G-ilgit at 

 5000 feet. 



The eggs that I possess, and have seen, of this species were all 

 from Cashmere, and were long, very blunt-ended ovals, a good deal 

 compressed towards one end. They are larger and very much more 

 elongated than those of Coracias inclica. They are, as a rule, pure 

 white and glossy, freshly laid ones having often a superb gloss ; 

 bat some of them, owing to diiferences in the texture of the shell, 

 I fancy, appear to be slightly mottled with a greyer white. 



They vary in length from 1'48 to 1-56 inch, and in breadth from 

 ]"06 to 1-16 ; a dozen eggs average 1'52 by 14 inch. 



Eurystomus orientalis (Linn.). ITie Broad-billed Boiler. 



Eurytomua orientalis (Linn.), Jerd. B. Ind, i, p. 210 ; Hume, Rough 

 Draft N. ^ E. no. 126. 



Mr. E. Thompson, writing from the Terai below Kumaon, 

 says : — " In April the Broad-billed Boilers arrive, begin to breed 

 in May, and finally leave the forests in July and August. They 

 breed in holes in the higher branches (never less than 50 feet from 

 the ground) of the loftiest sal trees. They extend from the 

 Sardah to the Ganges, but particularly abound in theKotree Doon, 

 where they breed in company with Eulabes intermedia in the dense 

 and lofty sal forests, to which they are strictly confined." 



Mr. E. W. Bourdillon writes from Travancore : — " On March 

 17th I was attracted by hearing the chattering of a pair of these 

 Boilers. On going to the spot I found them engaged in ejecting 

 from a hole in a vedu-pl& stump ( Callenia excelsa), about 40 feet 

 from the ground, a pair of our Hill-Mynahs {E, religiosa). One of 

 the Boilers was in tlie mouth of the hole, and enlarging it by 

 tearing away with its beak the soft rotten vi'ood. The other 

 Boiler, seated on a tree close by, wns doing most of the chattering, 

 making an occasional swoop at the Mynahs whenever they 

 ventured too close. I watched the birds for some time until the 

 Mynahs went ofi, and there and then began building in a pinney 

 tree (Calophyllum elatum) within the distance of 100 yards. 

 Ten days after I sent for some hillmen, who managed to ascend by 

 tying up sticks with strips of cane, in the way that they erect 

 ladders to obtain the wild honey from the tallest trees in the 

 forest. It was past six o'clock in the evening before a man 

 reached the hole in which the birds had bred, lie found not the 



