Birds. 



8753 



do not agree with me. The Hoe-be is not partieular in the choice of its 

 nesting-site ; it sometimes builds in a bush close to the ground, often 

 at various heights, and at others on the bough of a tree. The nest is 

 small and compact, rather flattened, cup-shaped, and formed of coarse 

 grasses and fibres exteriorly, lined with fine dried grass. The eggs 

 vary from three to five, and are of a deep greenish blue colour, with- 

 out spot or stain. The range of this species in Formosa appears to 

 extend throughout the entire champaign country and lower hills. I 

 have seen and procured it from Sawo, on the eastern coast ; Kelung, 

 north ; Tamsuy, north-west ; Taiwanfoo and Apes' Hill, south-west. 

 It feeds on almost every creeping thing of the great insect family, and 

 occasionally on birds of the Prinia group. I have frequently taken 

 entire birds' eggs out of its stomach. It searches throughout the 

 bushes more diligently than any schoolboy for the nests of small birds, 

 and ruthlessly sucks the eggs and devours the young. In this cha- 

 racter, as well as in some others, it approaches the jays ; but I think 

 its affinities are more decidedly Turdine. 



42. Garrulax ruficeps, Gould, Proc. Zool. Soc, 186*2, p. 281. 



43. G. pcecilorhynchus, Gould, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1862, p. 281. This 

 is a commoner bird than the last in the forest-ranges near Tamsuy, 

 but, like it, never descends to the lower unsheltered hills. It is a 

 noisy, chattering species, assembling several together in the under- 

 wood, and keeping up an incessant jabbering, with frequent loud, dis- 

 cordant cries interspersed. It is sly and vigilant, and tries to elude 

 observation, generally escaping from the opposite side of the bush it 

 is in, with short flights to the next, and so retreating from approach. 



44. Pomatorhinus musicus, Swinhoe, Journ. As. Soc. of Shanghai, 

 vol. ii. p. 228 (plate VI.) In 1857, in my voyage round Formosa in 

 H.M.S. 4 Inflexible,' I first came across this species, and described it 

 under the above name at a meeting of the North China Branch of the 

 Asiatic Society, at Shanghai. It is a very abundant species through- 

 out all the flat country and lower hills of Formosa. In every grove 

 and plantation you are sure to find some of this species in small 

 parties or in pairs, and frequently in company with the common Gar- 

 rulax taivanus. They have also much the habits of that group, col- 

 lecting in a bush and chattering loudly together, or hopping from 

 bough to bough, with rounded back and rounded partially expanded 

 tail. They have also the same affectionate manners towards one 

 another, sidling together on a bough, and rubbing and pecking one 

 another coaxingly. Like G. taivanus, they breed twice, and some- 



VOL. XXI. 3 L 



