hardens like pucca masonry in a very short time, and secures the nest from all marauders except the oologist.  The nest consists of a few dry leaves at the bottom of the cavity at no great depth, and upon this four eggs are laid.  The birds sit close and do not easily desert their nests, as the following instance will show.  In 1873 I found a Sitta’s nest in a mango-tree, and after watching the birds for some days, when the eggs had been laid I took the nest, placing my handkerchief in the nest to prevent bits of mud falling in on the eggs.  I opened out the cavity, cleaning away the mud, and putting in my hand I caught the female bird.  I looked at her and let her go.  In 1874 curiosity induced me to look at the place again, and to my surprise I saw the cavity had been built up again.  I caught a bird on the nest and took four eggs; it may have been a different bird, but there was only one pair in that tope of trees, and was probably the same bird I caught in 1873.  I found another nest in my garden about 2 feet from the ground, and I often used to flash the sunlight from a small hand-mirror, that I use out birds’ nesting, onto the hen bird while she sat on her eggs.  Our collection contains a large series of these eggs, the produce of some five-and-twenty nests taken by myself at Sitapur.”

Major C.T.  Bingham writes:—­“At Allahabad I found two nests of this little Nuthatch, one in July and one in September.  I regret to say neither contained any eggs, though the birds were going in and out constantly.  The nests were in tiny holes in mango-trees, the entrances being still more contracted by earth being plastered round.”

Colonel C.H.T.  Marshall observes:—­“A nest of the Chestnut-bellied Nuthatch was pointed out to me at Umballa in the next garden to mine.  It was about 12 feet above the ground in an old mango-tree; the locality chosen was the stump of a branch which had been cut off and had rotted down.  Outside there was a great deal of masonry work as hard and firm as that on white-ant hills, in the middle of which was a neat circular hole just large enough for the passage of the bird.  The masonry continued down inside the hole as far as I could see; I did not break it open, as there were nearly fledged young ones inside.  I knew this because the parent birds had been seen for some days carrying in food.  I did not see the nest till the end of May.  The following spring I found another nest at Kurnal in a bokain tree; it was constructed after the same fashion; the nest itself, which consisted only of dead leaves, was not very far down.  I was unfortunately this time (March 15th) too early for the eggs.  The holes are not easy to see from the ground, as they are most skilfully concealed from view.”