THE WHITE-BELLIED MUNIA. 
367 
a very small entrance near the top. The number of eggs is usually five 
and they are white. The nest of this bird is very often tenanted by a 
snake, and great care should be taken not to insert the hand without 
examination. 
544. AMADINA LEUCOGASTRA. 
THE WHITE-BELLIED MUNIA. 
Amadina leucogastra, Bl. J. A. S. B. xv. p. 286 (footnote) ; Hume, S. F. viii. p. 107. 
Munia leucogastra, Salvad. Ucc. Born. p. 267 ; Davison, S. F. v. p. 460; Hume 
8f Dav. S. F. vi. p. 402. 
Description. — Male and female. Cheeks, ear-coverts, throat, breast, under 
tail-coverts and sides of body deep brownish black, paler on the latter parts ; 
abdomen white, the white forming a sharp angle on the breast ; upper 
plumage chocolate-brown, all the feathers, except those of the head, being 
white-shafted ; upper tail-coverts black ; middle pair of tail-feathers shiny 
fulvous, the others dark brown with fulvous edges ; under wing-coverts 
white. 
Legs and feet dusky plumbeous or dull smalt-blue ; lower mandible dull 
smalt-, or pale, blue ; upper mandible brownish black or black ; irides 
dark brown. (Davison.) 
Length 4*5 inches, tail 1*8, wing 1*9, tarsus *55, bill from gape '45. 
The female appears to be of about the same size as the male. 
The White-bellied Munia occurs in the extreme south of Tenasserim, 
where Mr. Davison found it nesting. 
It extends down the Malay peninsula and is found in Borneo. 
Mr. Davison remarks that this bird is more a frequenter of forests than 
the other species. He found the nest near Malewoon on the 25th of April, 
a globular structure made of grass and bamboo-leaves and placed in the 
fork of a sapling about 7 feet from the ground. It contained a single white 
egg. It, however, probably lays five or six eggs like the other species. 
