These tiny eggs, almost smaller than those of any European bird that I know, are broad ovals, sometimes almost globular, but generally somewhat compressed towards one end, so as to assume something of a pyriform shape.  They are almost entirely glossless, have a pinkish or at times creamy-white ground, and exhibit a conspicuous reddish or purple zone towards the large end, composed of multitudes of minute spots almost confluent, and interspaced with a purplish cloud.  Faint traces of similar excessively minute purple or red points extend more or less above and below the zone.  The eggs vary from 0.53 to 0.58 in length, and from 0.43 to 0.46 in breadth; but the average of twenty-five is 0.56 nearly by 0.45 nearly.

41.  Machlolophus spilonotus (Bl.). The Blade-spotted Yellow Tit.

Machlolophus spilonotus (Bl.), Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 281.

Mr. Mandelli found a nest of this species at Lebong in Sikhim on the 15th June in a hole in a dead tree, about 5 feet from the ground.  The nest was a mere pad of the soft fur of some animal, in which a little of the brown silky down from fern-stems and a little moss was intermingled.  It contained three hard-set eggs.

One of these eggs is a very regular oval, scarcely, if at all, pointed towards the lesser end; the ground-colour is a pure dead white, and the markings, spots, and specks of pale reddish brown, and underlying spots of pale purple, are evenly scattered all over the egg; it measures 0.78 by 0.55.

42.  Machlolophus xanthogenys (Vig.). The Yellow-cheeked Tit.

Machlolophus xanthogenys (Vig.) Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 279; Hume, Rough Draft N. & E. no. 647.

The Yellow-cheeked Tit is one of the commonest birds in the neighbourhood of Simla, yet curiously enough I have never found a nest.

I have had eggs and nest sent me, and I know it breeds throughout the Western Himalayas, at elevations of from 4000 to 7000 feet; and that it lays during April and May (and probably other months), making a soft pad-like nest, composed of hair and fur, in boles in trees and walls; but I can give no further particulars.

Captain Hutton tells us that it is “common in the hills throughout the year.  It breeds in April, in which month a nest containing four fledged young ones was found at 5000 feet elevation; it was constructed of moss, hair, and feathers, and placed at the bottom of a deep hole in a stump at the foot of an oak tree.”

Writing from Dhurmsala, Captain Cock says:—­“Towards the end of April this bird made its nest in a hole of a tree just below the terrace of my house.  Before the nest was quite finished a pair of Passer cinnamomeus bullied the old birds out of the place, which they deserted.  After they had left it I cut the nest out and found it nearly ready to lay in, lined with soft goat-hair and that same dark fur noticed in the nest of Parus monticola.”