592 
Mr. G-. L. Bates on the 
appearing. Young birds of this species have the inside of 
the mouth marked in a manner very similar to those of the 
various species of Estrilda (cf . text-fig. 17, p. 594). 
Most of my specimens of this bird were snared on ripe 
bunches of palm-nuts, the oily husks of which are a favourite 
food of this and many other birds. The stomachs of 
specimens shot contained small caterpillars. An incubating 
female (No. 3119) was brought to me alive, with a nest and 
five eggs. The nest was much like that, of an Estrilda, but 
larger, and was composed of a loose mass of dried leaves, 
lined with a more compact structure of grass-tops; it 
was placed in a forked twig of a small tree. The eggs 
are perfectly white, with little or no gloss, and measure 
16 x 11*5 mm. 
Nigrita luteifrons. 
Sharpe, Ibis, 1908^, p. 346. 
In this species the iris is greyish-vdiite or greyish cream- 
coloured. A young specimen, No. 4431, has the plumage 
even more nearly uniformly grey than the adult female, 
since it lacks the black around the eye and the whitish 
colours on the forehead. This young bird had the margin 
of the gape black, with four wdiite warts or wattles, one just 
at the angle of the gape and two above and one below this; 
there w r ere spots on the palate and tongue like those of 
Estrilda [cf. text-fig. 1 7, B & C, p. 594). 
In the paper by Sharpe in ‘The Ibis’ (/. c. supra) specimens 
of this species are mentioned from Efulen, but none from 
the Ja. Specimens have now been obtained at Bitye and at 
Assobam. These were not secured, as were most specimens 
of the other species of Nigrita, by means of snares placed on 
or under palm-trees, but w^ere shot ; their food was found, 
in every case recorded, to have consisted of scale-insects or 
Cocci. 
Nigrita fusconota. 
Beichenow, Y. A. iii. p. 168. 
Nigritapinaronota Sharpe, Ibis, 1908, p. 345. 
In this species the iris is dark brown. Young birds have 
