420 PHAS1ANIDJ5. 



eggs of Jungle-fowl, but as I was hard up for provisions I gene- 

 rally ate them. I preserved, however, four which I send you ; 

 they were found on the 13th April in a scratched-out pan of a 

 nest in thick bamboo-jungle." 



From Upper PegU, where they are quite as common in the hills 

 as in the plains, Mr. Gates sent me eggs taken by him on the 20th 

 March and 25th May. He says :— " In Pegu this species appears 

 to breed throughout the first six months of the year, but more 

 frequently in April, May, and June. Nests at all elevations from 

 100 to 2000 feet above sea-level." 



The eggs vary a good deal in size and shape, but typically they 

 are miniature hen's eggs ; considerably elongated varieties are, 

 however, common. The shell is, as a rule, very fine and smooth, 

 and has a tolerable gloss, but specimens occur in which the pores 

 are much more marked than usual, the shell coarser and rouglier, 

 and the gloss very faint. As to colour they are normally a pale 

 yellowish cafe-au-lait colour, but occasionally a redder and deeper- 

 coloured egg is met with. 



In length the eggs vary from 1-6 to 2-03 and in breadth from 

 1-27 to 1-5 ; but the average of thirty eggs is 1-78 by 1-36. 



Gallus sonnerati, Temm. The Grey Jungle-fowl. 



GalluB sonneratii, Temm., Jercl. S. Ind. ii, p. 539 ; Hume, Hough 

 Draft N. Sf E. no. 813. 



The Grey Jungle-fowl is found and breeds throughout the 

 peninsula of India in suitable localities, extending northwards in 

 the Central Provinces to Puchmurree, being the only Jungle-fowl 

 of the Satpooras, and on the west reaching as far north as Mount 

 Aboo and Serohi. It does not, that I could discover, extend further 

 up the Aravallis than this latter locality. It ascends the Nilghiris 

 to 5000 feet, and Aboo as high as the Oonja or Jawi Plateaux, or 

 say about 4800 feet. Two eggs were taken in May when I was at 

 Aboo, but as to the breeding-season and other particulars I must 

 let my correspondents speak. 



"Writing from Aboo, Dr. King noted that " the eggs were found 

 here from the middle of April to the end of May. The nest was 

 described by the Bheels and shikarees (for I never went down to 

 take one myself) as similar to that of the Spur-fowl {O. spcidiceus), 

 but larger, and like it placed in clumps of bamboc^ or other thick 

 undergrowth." 



Mr. J. Davidson says : — " I found it breeding in Satara in March 

 and April, but in Mysore in July." 



Mr. Mclnroy writes : — " I have seen chicks of about a week old, 

 both in April and November, within a few miles of Hunsur (S.W. 

 Mysore)." 



Colonel Butler remarks : — " Although I have never seen the nest 

 myself, still having had both the eggs and young brought to me on 

 several occasions, I can speak from very reliable experience. At 



