o a fork at the end of a bough of a
cypress tree, about 10 feet from the ground, the entrance turned
inwards towards the trunk of the tree. It contained one tiny egg,
white, with a dark cloudy zone round the larger end.

"About the 10th of May, at Naini Tal, I was watching one of these
little birds, which kept hanging about a small rhododendron stump
about 2 feet high, with very few leaves on it, but I could see no
nest. A few days later I saw the bird carry a big caterpillar to the
same stump and come away shortly without it; so I looked more
closely and found the nest, containing nearly full-fledged young, so
beautifully wedged into the stump that it appeared to be part of it,
and nothing but the tiny circular entrance revealed that the nest was
there. It was the best-concealed nest for that style of position that
I have ever seen."

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,