fall of snow on the mountains. Naturally it is
in the districts nearest the hills that most of these rare birds are
seen--but there is no part of Northern India in which they may not
occur.

The nesting activity of birds in Upper India attains its zenith in
May, and then declines until it reaches its nadir in November. With
December it begins again to increase.

Of those birds whose nests were described last month the white-backed
vulture, Pallas's fishing-eagle, the tawny eagle, the sand-martin and
the black-necked stork are likely to be found with eggs or young in
the present month.

December marks the beginning of the nesting season for three large
owls--the brown fish-owl, the rock horned-owl and the dusky
horned-owl. The brown fish-owl (_Ketupa ceylonensis_) is a bird almost
as large as a kite. It has bright orange orbs and long, pointed
aigrettes. Its legs are devoid of feathers. According to Blanford it
has a dismal cry like _haw_, _haw_, _haw_, _ho_. "Eha" describes the
call as a ghostly hoot--a _hoo hoo hoo_, far-reaching, but coming from
nowhere in particular. These two descriptions do not seem to agree.
There is nothing unusual in this.

The descriptions of the calls of the nocturnal birds of prey given by
India ornithologists are notoriously unsatisfactory. This is perhaps
not surprising when we consider the wealth of bird life in this
country. It is no easy matter to ascertain the perpetrators of the
various sounds of the night, and, when the naturalist has succeeded in
fixing the author of any call, he finds himself confronted with the
difficult task of describing the sound in question. Bearing in mind
the way in which human interjections baffle the average writer, we
cannot be surprised at the poor success that crowns the endeavours of
the naturalist to syllabise bird notes.

As regards the call of the brown fish-owl the writer has been trying
for the past three or four years to determine by observation which of
the many nocturnal noises are to be ascribed to this species. With
this object he kept one of these owls captive for several weeks; the
bird steadfastly refused to utter a sound. One hoot would have
purchased its liberty; but the bird would not pay the price: it sulked
and hissed. The bird in question, although called a fish-owl, does not
live chiefly on fish. Like others of its kind it feeds on birds, rats
and mice. Hume found in the nest of this species two quails, a pigeon,
a dove and a