“April 29, 1876.  A nest containing 3 fresh eggs. 
“May   16, 1876.     "       "     3 fresh eggs. 
“May   21, 1876.     "       "     2 fresh eggs. 
“Nov.  15, 1876.     "       "     4 young birds.

“I found numerous nests from the middle of July to the beginning of September.  On the 26th July, 1876, I saw upwards of a dozen nests, some containing fresh eggs, and others incubated.  In many instances they contained eggs of Coccystes jacobinus.  The nest is usually placed 3 or 4 feet from the ground in low thorny bashes (Zizyphus jujuba preferred) or in a tussock of sarpat grass.  It is built of twigs, roots, grass, &c., loosely put together exteriorly but closely woven interiorly, the lining being composed of fine roots and grass-stems.  The eggs vary in number from three to five.”

Lieut.  H.E.  Barnes, writing of Rajputana, says:—­“The Striated Bush-Babbler breeds from March to July.  The nest is usually placed in a low thorny bush, and is composed of grass-roots and stems; it is deep cup-shaped, neatly and compactly built.”

The eggs are typically of a moderately elongated oval shape, slightly compressed towards one end, but more or less spherical and pyriform varieties occur; and I have one specimen, a very long pointed egg, which, so far as size and shape go, might pass for an egg of Cypselus affinis; and though this is a peculiarly abnormal shape, I have others which somewhat approach it in form.  The eggs are glossy, often brilliantly so, and of a delicate, pure, spotless, somewhat pale blue.  The shade of colour in this egg varies very little, and I have never met with either the very pale or very dark varieties common amongst the eggs of C. canorus and occasionally found amongst those of A. malcolmi.  In colour, size, and shape they are not very unlike those of our English Hedge-Sparrow, whose early eggs formed the prize of our first boyish nesting-expeditions, but they are slightly larger and typically somewhat more elongated.

In length they vary from 0.75 to 0.92, and in breadth from 0.6 to 0.7; but the average of one hundred and fifteen eggs measured was 0.82 by 0.64.

107.  Argya malcolmi (Sykes). The Large Grey Babbler.

Malacocercus malcolmi (Sykes), Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 64. 
Argya malcolmi (Sykes), Hume, Rough Draft N. & E. no. 436.

The Large Grey Babbler breeds throughout the central portions of both the Peninsula and Continent of India from the Nilghiris to the Dhoon.  It does not extend westwards to Sindh or the North-West Punjab, or eastwards far into Bengal Proper.  In the Central and North-West Provinces it lays from early in March well into September, having at least two and, as I believe, often three broods.