14 COEYIBJE.

March, and the young are fledged by the end of April. The nest
is like that of the European bird, and all the manners of the
Afghan Magpie are precisely the same. They may be seen at all
seasons."

From Afghanistan, Lieut. H. E. Barnes writes :—

" The Magpie is not uncommon in the hills wherever there are
trees, but it seldom descends to the plains. They commence
breeding in March, in which month and April I have examined
scores of nests, which in every case were built in the ' "Wun/ a
species of Pistada—the only tree found hereabouts. A stout fork
near the top is usually selected.

" The nest is shallow and cup-shaped, with a superstructure of
twigs, forming a canopy over the egg-cavity. The eggs, generally
five in number, are of the usual corvine green, blotched, spotted,
and streaked, as a rule, most densely about the large end with
umber mingled with sepia-brown. The average of thirty eggs is
1-25 by -97."

Colonel Biddulph writes in c The Ibis' that in Grilgit he took a
nest with five eggs, hard set, in a mulberry-tree at Nonval (5600
feet) on the 9th May. Also another nest with, three fresh eggs at
Dayour (5200 feet) on the 25th May.

The eggs are typically rather elongated ovals, rather pointed
towards the small end, but shorter and broader varieties, aud occa-
sionally ones with a pyriform tendency, occur. The ground is
a greenish or brownish white. In some eggs it has none, in others
a slight gloss. Everywhere the eggs are finely and streakly
freckled with a brown that varies from olive almost to sepia; about
the large end the markings are almost always most dense, forming
there a more or less noticeable, but quite irregular and undefined
cap or zone. In one or two eggs dull purplish-brown clouds or
blotches underlie and intermingle with this cap, and occasionally a
small spot of this same tint may be noticed elsewhere when the
egg is closely examined.

12. Urocissa occipitalis (BL). The Red-billed Slue Magpie.

Urocissa sinensis (Linn.\ Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 309.

Urocissa occipitalis (JBL), Hume, Rough Draft N. $ E. no. 671.

I have never myself found the nest of the B/ed-billed Blue Mag-
pie ; although it does breed sparingly as far east as Simla and Kote-
gurh, it is not till you cross the Jumna that it is abundant. East
of the Jumna, about Mussoorie, Teeree, Grurhwal, Kumaon, and in
Nepal, it is common.

Erom Mussoorie Captain Hutton tells us that " this species
occurs at Mussoorie throughout the year. It breeds at an elevation'
of 5000 feet in May and June, making a loose nest of twigs exter-
nally and lined with roots. The nest is built on trees, sometimes
high up, at others about 8 or 10 feet from the ground. The eggs
are from three to five, of a dull greenish ash-grey, blotched and