421 
Egg-collecting in Asia Minor. 
train for Smyrna, which I reached at 4 p.m., and then drove 
at once to Bournabat. 
On the following day, May 16th, I revisited the salt-lagoons 
along the coast near Smyrna. On the little island which I 
had previously explored I found several clutches of Pratin¬ 
coles’ eggs ( Glareola pratincola). For a long time I could 
discover nothing, as I looked for these eggs on the expanses 
of sun-dried mud, on which I thought these birds were 
accustomed to lay, and on which I saw them standing or 
crouching with outstretched wings. At last I began to search 
among the heathery scrub with which much of the island 
was covered, and soon found several clutches of three richly- 
marked eggs, always laid on the bare ground among, and 
often quite overshadowed by, the bushy plants. Among 
these bushes 1 also found three eggs of a Kentish Plover 
(/.Egialitis cantiana). On some banks of bare sand at the 
water’s edge I discovered a number of Lesser Terns ( Sterna 
minuta) breeding, as well as a few Common Terns ( Sterna 
fluviatilis), and another pair of Kentish Plovers. 
Having slept in the launch that night, I visited on the 
following morning some more salt-lagoons on a part of the 
coast a little nearer to Smyrna. On an island in one of these 
lagoons we found a colony of Gull-billed Terns (Sterna 
anglica). These birds had not long commenced laying, for 
although I found a good number of nests with the full clutch 
of three eggs, there were numbers containing only one or 
two. In most cases the eggs had been laid on the bare ground, 
without any attempt at a nest, in small bare places among 
the scrubby kind of heathery plants I have before spoken of. 
On this island I found a few more Pratincoles’ eggs, also 
among the scrub, but at some distance from the Gull-billed 
Terns’ nests. On some stretches of open sand round the 
edges of this island I found Lesser and Common Terns 
breeding, and also took the three eg'gs of a pair of Oyster- 
catchers, which I had remarked when we first landed. There 
were a pair of Avocets ( Recurvirostra avocetta) and a good 
many Kentish Plovers on the island too, but I was unable to 
discover where they had placed their eggs, if they had any. 
ser. VII.—VOL. vi. 2 g 
