According to Mr. Hodgson’s notes and figures, the Chestnut-headed Flycatcher-Warbler breeds in the central hill-region of Nepal from April to June, laying three or four eggs, which are neither figured nor described.  The nest itself is a beautiful structure of mosses, lichens, moss- and fern-roots, and fine stems worked into the shape of a large egg, measuring 6 and 4 inches along the longer and shorter diameters; it is placed on the ground in the midst of a clump of ferns or thick grass, with the longer diameter perpendicular to the ground.  The aperture, which is about halfway between the middle and the top of the nest, and on one side, is oval, about 2 inches in width and 1.75 in height.  Both sexes are said to assist in hatching and rearing the young.

438.  Cryptolopha cantator (Tick.). Tickell’s Flycatcher-Warbler.

Culicipeta cantator (Tick.), Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 200.  Abrornis cantator (Tick.), Hume, Rough Draft N. & E. no. 570.

A nest containing a single egg has been sent me as that of Tickell’s Flycatcher-Warbler.  It was found in May in Native Sikhim, at an elevation, it is said, of 12,000 feet.  It was suspended to the tip of a branch of a tree at a height of about 8 feet from the ground.  The nest is a most lovely one; but I confess that I have doubts as to its really belonging to this species.

The nest is, for the size of the bird, a large watch-pocket, some 6 inches in total length and 3.5 in breadth, composed entirely of white, satiny seed-down, densely felted together to the thickness of half an inch.  The lower part, sides, and back very thinly, and the upper portion and the margin of the mouth of the pocket thickly, coated with excessively fine green moss and very fine soft vegetable fibre.

My sole reason for doubting the authenticity of the nest is that another precisely similar one was sent me by another collector, a European, as belonging to an Aethopyga, together with the female which he shot off the nest.

The present nest contained a pure white egg; the other spotted eggs.  Both collectors I have no doubt were fully assured of the correctness of their identification, and it may be that both species of birds construct similar nests; but I entertain considerable doubts on this subject, and think it right to note the fact.

The egg is a very broad oval, pure white, and very glossy, and measures 0.6 by 0.49.

Mr. Mandelli sends me a lovely nest, which he says belongs to this species.  It was found in May in Native Sikhim, at about 12,000 feet elevation.  It was suspended from the tiny branch of a tree at a height of about 8 feet from the ground.  The nest is a perfect watch-pocket, composed entirely of white silky down belonging to one of the bombaxes, thinly coated here and there with strings of moss to keep it together, and more thickly so with this and vegetable fibre at and about the point of suspension