as if beneath the shell.  The nest is small and cup-shaped, composed of fine roots, dry grasses, flower-stalks chiefly of forget-me-not, and a few dead leaves occasionally interwoven; in some the outside is also smeared over here and there with cobwebs and silky seed-down; the lining is usually of very fine roots.  Some nests have four eggs, which are liable to great variation both in the intensity of colouring and in the size and number of spots.”

284.  Molpastes leucogenys (Gr.). The White-cheeked Bulbul.

Otocompsa leucogenys (Gray), Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 90; Hume, Rough Draft N. & E. no. 458.

The White-cheeked Bulbul breeds throughout the Himalayas, from Afghanistan to Bhootan, from April to July, and at all heights from 3000 to 7000 feet.  The nest is a loose, slender fabric, externally composed of fine stems of some herbaceous plant and a few blades of grass, and internally lined with very fine hair-like grass.  The nests may measure externally, at most, 4 inches in diameter; but the egg-cavity, which is in proportion very large and deep, is fully 21/4 inches across by 13/4 inch deep.  As I before said, the nest is usually very slightly and loosely put together, so that it is difficult to remove it without injury; but sometimes they are more substantial, and occasionally the cup is much shallower and wider than I have above described.  Four is the full complement of eggs.

Captain Unwin says:—­“I found a nest containing three fresh eggs near the village of Jaskote, in the Agrore Valley, on the 24th April, 1870.  The nest was placed about 5 feet from the ground in a small wild ber-tree in a water-course.  On the 7th May I found another nest placed in a small thick cheer-tree in the same valley, which contained four eggs.”

From Murree, Colonel C.H.T.  Marshall tells us that this species “breeds in the valleys, at about 4000 or 5000 feet up, in the end of June.  Lays four eggs with a white ground, very thickly blotched with claret-red; nest roughly made of grass and roots, in low bushes.”

About Simla and the valleys of the Sutlej and Beas I have found it common, and my experience of its nidification in these localities has been above recorded.

From Mussoorie, Captain Hutton wrote that it is “common in the Dhoon throughout the year, and in the hills during the summer.  It breeds in April and May.  The nest is neat and cup-shaped, placed in the forks of bushes or pollard trees, and is composed externally of the dried stalks of forget-me-not, lined with fine grass-stalks.  Eggs three or four, rosy or faint purplish white, thickly sprinkled with specks and spots of darker rufescent purple or claret colour.  Sometimes the outside of the nest is composed of fine dried stalks of woody plants, whose roughness causes them to adhere together.”

Mr. W.E.  Brooks remarks:—­“I found this bird common at Almorah, and procured several nests.  They were placed in a bush or small tree, and were slightly composed of fine grass, roots, and fibres:  eggs three; ground-colour purplish white, speckled all over, most densely at the larger end, with spots and blotches of purple-brown and purplish grey:  laying in Kumaon from the beginning of May to June.”