MEGALimiJS.	249
unable to ascertain, either Bonaparte or Yerreaux figured or de-
scribed the specimens Tyfcler sent them in some French work.
1 have only one supposed nest of this species, brought me from
Dacca by a native collector who worked there for me under Mr.
P. B. Simsou. He did not take it himself; it was brought to him
with one of the parent birds by a shikaree. The evidence is,
therefore, very bad, but I give the facts for what they are worth.
The nest is a rather massive and deep cup, the lower portion
prolonged downwards so as to form a short truncated cone. It is
fixed between three reeds, is constructed of sedge and vegetable
fibre firmly wound together and round the reeds, and is lined with
fine grass-roots. It measures externally 5 inches in height and
nearly 4 inches in diameter, measuring outside the reeds which are
incorporated in the outer surface of the nest. The cavity is about
2| inches in diameter and nearly 2 inches deep. It contained four
eggs, hard-set; only one could be preserved, and that was broken
in bringing up-country ; so I could not measure it, but the shell
was a sort of pale greenish grey or dull greenish white, rather
thickly but very faintly speckled and spotted with very dull purplish
and reddish brown, with some grey spots intei'iningled. The nest
was obtained (no date noted) between the middle of July and the
middle of August. I note that the eggs were on the point of
hatching, so that the fresh egg would probably be somewhat brighter
coloured.
389. Megalurus palustris, Horsf.    The Striated MarsJi-Warbler.
Megalnrus palustris, Horsf.. Jerd. JB. Ind. ii, p. 70; Hume, Rouqh
Draft N. $• E. no. 440.
jN"othing has hitherto been recorded of the nidification of the
Striated Marsh-Warbler, although it has a very wide distribution
and is very common in suitable localities.
The Striated Marsh-Babbler, as Jerdon calls it, has nothing of the
Babbler in it. It rises perpendicularly out of the reeds, sings
rather screechingly while in the air, and descends suddenly. It has
much more of a song than any of the Babblers, a much stronger
flight, and its sudden, upward, towering flight and equally sudden
descent are unlike anything seen amongst the Babblers.
Mr. E. 0. Nunn procured the nest and an egg of this species
(which along with the parent birds he kindly forwarded to me) at
Hoshungabad on the 4th May, 1868. The nest was round, com-
posed of dry grass, and situated in a cluster of reeds between two
rocks in the bed of the Nerbudda. It contained a single fresh egg.
Writing from Wan, in the Pegu District, Mr. Gates remarks :—
^ftl found a nest on the 19th May containing four eggs recently
laid. The female flew off only at the last moment, when my pony
was about to tread on the tuft of grass she had selected for her
home.
" The nest was placed in a small but very dense grass-tuft about
a foot above the ground. It was made entirely of coarse grasses,