582 
Mr. G. L. Bates on the 
(a discrepancy possibly accounted for by tbe more worn 
condition of the plumage in the type) ; and the bill black, 
instead of pale grey, as in the type. The measurements are 
also a trifle greater :—bill 17, wing 79 mm. 
The male (No. 3017), undoubtedly the mate of No. 3016 
—they were in company when shot, and both had enlarged 
breeding-organs,—is a bird of exactly the same size as the 
female, and is similarly coloured except on the head. It 
has the forehead and crown golden-yellow instead of black, 
and the middle of the throat is black, like the rest of the 
plumage. 
The male of t his species is here described for the first time. 
Ploceus nigrjcollis. [Ngas.] 
Bates, Ibis, 1909, p. 43. 
Nests of the Ngas have been found, with eggs or nestlings, 
in eight different months of the year, and in all four seasons ; 
but the greatest numbers were observed in August and 
September at the beginning of the principal rainy season, 
and somewhat smaller numbers in March at the beginning 
of the “ little 99 rainy season. Insect food is probably most 
abundant in the rainy seasons. During the last two and a 
half years spent at Bitye, thirty Ngas’s nests have been 
brought to me with the sitting birds, usuall} r caught at night 
in the nest, but sometimes shot with bow and arrow in the 
nest. Some nests contained nestlings, others broken eggs; 
but I have saved twenty-nine eggs as specimens. Only one 
clutch contained more than two eggs. 
These nests all shew certain characteristics distinguishing 
them from those of other Weavers. They are a little smaller 
than those of Ploceus amaurocephalus and have well-formed 
entrance-tubes, usually extending from two to five inches 
below the bottom of the nest. They are always composed 
of the slender, tough, dry runners of the Convolvulacese, 
which grow abundantly in h’lkotok , and sometimes have 
grass interwoven. One nest was attached to a twig which 
had a wreath like the beginning of another nest higher up, 
as if the bird had begun to build there, and then left that 
