In length the eggs vary from 0.6 to 0.75, and in breadth from 0.48 to 0.55; but the average of sixteen eggs is 0.66 by 0.5.

406.  Phylloscopus tytleri, Brooks. Tytler’s Willow-Warbler.

Phylloscopus tytleri, Brooks, Hume, Rough Draft N. & E. no. 560 bis.

Tytler’s Willow-Warbler, as yet a rare bird in collections, and which appears only to straggle down to the plains of Upper India during the cold season, was found by Captain Cock breeding at Sonamerg (9400 feet elevation) in the Sindh Valley, Cashmere, in June.

Mr. Brooks, who discriminated the bird, said of it and its nidification:—­“In plumage resembling P. viridanus, but of a richer and deeper olive; it is entirely without the ‘whitish wing-bar,’ which is always present in viridanus, unless in very abraded plumage.  The wing is shorter, so is the tail; but the great difference is in the bill, which is much longer, darker, and of a more pointed and slender form in P. tytleri.  The song and notes are utterly different, so are the localities frequented. P. viridanus is an inhabitant of brushwood ravines, at 9000 and 10,000 feet elevation; while P. tytleri is exclusively a pine-forest Phylloscopus.  In the places frequented by P. viridanus, it must build on the ground, or very near it; but our new species builds, 40 feet up a pine-tree, a compact half-domed nest on the side of a branch.

“Captain Cock shot one of this species off the nest at Sonamerg with four eggs.  The bird he sent to me, and gave me two of the eggs.  Regarding the nest he says:  ’I took a nest, containing four eggs, about 40 feet up a pine, on the outer end of a bough, by means of ropes and sticks, and I shot the female bird.  I do not know what the bird is.  I thought it was P. viridanus, but I send it to you.  The nest was very deep, solidly built, and cup-shaped.  Eggs, plain white.’  In conversation with Captain Cock he afterwards told me that he had watched the bird building its nest.  It was rather on the side of the branch, and its solid formation reminded him of a Goldfinch’s nest.  It was composed of grass, fibres, moss, and lichens externally and thickly lined with hair and feathers.  The eggs were pure unspotted white, rather smaller than those of Reguloides occipitalis.  Two of them measured .58 by .48 and .57 by .45.  They were taken on the 4th June.”

Captain Cock himself writes to me:—­“Of all the birds’ nests that I know of, this is one of the most difficult to find.  One day in the forest at Sonamerg, Cashmere, I noticed a Warbler fly into a high pine with a feather in its bill.  I watched with the glasses and saw that it was constructing a nest, so allowing a reasonable time to elapse (nine days or so) I went and took the nest.  It was placed on the outer end of a bough, about 40 feet up a high pine, and I had to take the nest by means of a spar lashed at right angles to the tree, the outer extremity of which was supported by a rope fastened to the top of the pine.  The nest was a very solid, deep cup, of grass, fibres, and lichens externally, and lined with hair and feathers.  It contained four white eggs, measuring 0.58 by 0.48.