Mr. J.L.  Darling, Jun., states that this bird is very common in Culputty in the Wynaad, at an elevation of about 3000 feet, and that he has found the nests from the end of May to the middle of October.  The nest is built in high grass nearly on the ground, or in date-palms, or in arrowroot in the jungle up to heights of 3 feet.  The nest is built entirely of grass, lined with finer grass; a nearly round ball 6 inches in diameter outside and 5 inside, with a hole on the side.  The eggs are laid at the rate of one a day, and three are usually found in one nest, occasionally only two.  On one occasion after securing the female bird, he found the cock bird sitting on the eggs and he continued to sit there for three days.

Mr. J. Davidson tells us that he found a nest of this bird on the 15th July at Kondabhari with four fresh eggs.

Colonel Legge writes in his ’Birds of Ceylon’:—­“The breeding-season lasts from March until July, the nests being built in a low bush sometimes only a few inches from the ground.”

In shape the eggs are moderately elongated ovals.  The shell is very fine and smooth, and has in some a rather bright, in some only a very slight gloss.  The ground is a China-white.  The markings consist of a profusion of specks and spots of a very bright red, which, though spread over the whole surface, are gathered most densely into an imperfect, more or less confluent, cap or zone at the larger end, where also a few purplish-grey spots and specks not usually found on any other part of the egg, are noticeable.

In length the eggs vary from 0.66 to 0.78, and in breadth from 0.5 to 0.55.  The average of 28 eggs is 0.72 by 0.53.

139.  Pyctorhis sinensis (Gm.). The Yellow-eyed Babbler.

Pyctorhis sinensis (Gm.), Jerd.  B. Ind. ii, p. 15; Hume, Rough Draft N.& E. no. 385.

The Yellow-eyed Babbler breeds throughout the plains of India, as also in the Nilghiris, to an elevation of 5000 feet, and in the Himalayas to perhaps 4000 feet.  It lays in the latter part of June, in July, August, and September.  Gardens are the favourite localities and in these the little bird makes its compact and solid nest, sometimes in a fork of the fine twigs of a lime-bush, sometimes in a mangoe-, orange-, or apple-tree, occasionally suspended between three stout grass-stems, or even attached to a single stem of the huge grass from which the native pens are made.  I have taken a nest, hung between three reeds, exactly resembling in shape and position the Reed-Warbler’s nest (Salicaria arundinacea), figured in Mr. Yarrell’s vignette at page 313, vol. i. 3rd edition.

The nest is typically cone-shaped (the apex downwards), from 5 to 6 inches in depth, and 3 or 4 in diameter at the base; but it varies of course according to situation, the cone being often broadly truncated.  In the base of the cone (which is uppermost) is the egg-cavity, measuring from 2 to 3 inches in diameter, and from 2 to 2.5 inches in depth.  The nest is very compactly and solidly woven, of rather broad blades of grass, and long strips of fine fibrous bark, exteriorly more or less coated with cobwebs and gossamer-threads.  Interiorly, fine grass-stems and roots are neatly and closely interwoven.  I once found some horse-hair along with the grass-roots, but this is unusual.