iiijs. 227 



the latter I procured four, which w ere all I was allowed to take, as 

 the villagers objected to the birds being disturbed." 



Colonel Butler sends me the following note : — " Mr. Doig and I 

 found a colony of about a dozen pairs breeding in the E. Narra, Sind, 

 on the 24th July, 1878. The whole of (he nests, which were about 

 1 foot apart and about 8 or ]0 feet from the surface of the water, 

 Mere small stick structures similar to Egrets' nests, and were closely 

 ])acked on a tree that had been partly blown down, in the centre 

 of a dense tamarisk-thicket growing in the middle of a large dhund. 



" Large colonies of Herons, Egrets, Cormorants, and Snake-birds 

 were breeding all round in the same clump of trees, but their nests 

 were not built in clusters like those of the Ibises. On approaching 

 the spot, the Ibises rose off their nests and commenced flying round 

 and round and backwards and forwards overhead ; and on sending 

 a man up the tree, the nests, with the exception of one with young 

 ones, were all found to. contain fresh eggs, most of which were plain 

 but in a few instances spotted with yellowish brown. We found 

 out afterwards that the men with us had robbed these nests the 

 week before, so tliat this was a second batch of eggs. Mr. Doig 

 drew my attention to the peculiar booming call of the bird, which 

 he described as a most remarkable note, but 1 did not hear it my- 

 self. There was another colony a little further on, but as the 

 jungle was thick and the water deep we did not visit it." 



Messrs. Davidson and Wenden, writing of the Deccan, say : — 

 " Not rare. D., having observed them this year on the Bhima from 

 October until about the middle of July, concludes that they pro- 

 bably breed in the district." 



Colonel Legge writes from Ceylon : — " Several pairs of these 

 Ibises were frequenting the breeding-place already noticed at Udu- 

 VI ila tank near Tissa Maha Eama ; but their nests were on trees 

 growing in the water and inaccessible, and consequently I was un- 

 able to procure their eggs or young. The time of my visit was the 

 25th March, and as most birds then had young, I conclude the same 

 was the case with the present species." 



1 know no species of which the eggs vary more in size than those 

 of our present bird. 



The cubic contents of some specimens that I possess are of fully 

 three times those of some others. In shape too the variation is 

 great ; typically they are long ovals, much pointed tow ards one 

 end, but some are nearly perfect ovals. Some are pointed at both 

 ends, like a Cormorant's egg, and some are pyriform. When 

 freshly laid, they are of a delicate bluish or greenish white, but 

 little, if at all, darker than the eggs of Buhulcus coram aiidvs; but 

 during incubation the blue or green tint fades and disappears, and 

 the white gets soiled or stained till some eggs are all brown and 

 dirty, like a hard-set egg of Anastomus osciians. 



1'he majority of eggs are free from spots or markings, but I have 

 met v^ith a few examples delicately spotted with yellowish brown. 

 I he texture of the eggs, though slightly coarser, is quite that of the 

 Heron, and I have no doubt that these Ibises are correctly placed 



15* 



