THE BIRDS OF SINGAPORE ISLAND 
crown. It has no song wortli mentioning but it is nevertheless 
rarely silent, its cheery chattering in the shrubs being continu- 
ally in one's ears. 
Other habits: — The cup^shaped nests which in Singapore 
are made, and in some years contain eggs, as early as the 
second half of February are easy enough to find and a good 
many biilbuls breed each year in the Botanic Gardens. The 
nests are usually pkced in a bush (often an isolated one 
growing on a lawn) or in a hedge surroimding a tennis court. 
Two eggs are laid. They have the ^Tound colour white j 
perhaps tinged with pink, and marked either with bold blotches 
or less well-defined splashes and speckled with some shade of 
brown. The eggs in fact are very variable in colour. 
To a large extent the food consists of insects and berries 
and Ridley quite rightly remarks that: *'it is an omnivorous 
bird, devouring small fruits of all kinds, especially those of the 
Waringin (Ficits benjomijiti) and the cinnamons, and is very 
troublesome when the fruit is w^anted for any purposej often 
clearing the wbok tree and disseminating seeds in all kinds 
of places, where young trees come up in the most unexpected 
manner. It, however, atones for the trouble it gives to some 
extent by destroying a good many injurions insects srich as 
grasshoppers and termites'*. 
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