226 SYLTIIDJS.

with minute specks, too minute for one to be able to say of what
colour; over this are pretty thickly scattered fairly bold and well-
marked spots and blotches of greyish black, inky purple, olive-
brown, yellowish olive, and reddish-umber brown; here and there
pale inky clouds underlay the more distinct markings. In other
eggs the stippling is altogether wanting, and the markings are
smaller and less well-defined. In some eggs one or more of the
colours predominate greatly, and in some several are almost entirely
wanting. In most eggs the markings are densest towards the
large end, where they sometimes form more or less of a mottled,
irregular, ill-defined cap.

In length the eggs vary from 0*8 to 0'97, and in breadth from
0'58 to 0*63; but the average of the only nine eggs that I measured
was 0*89, nearly, by rather more than 0-61.

366. Acrocephalus dumetorum, Blyth. Biyth's Reed-WaMer.

Acrocephalus duinetoruni, JBl., Jerd. B. 2nd. ii, p. 155.

Calainody ta durnetorum (-#£)? Hume, Rough Draft N. fy E. no. 51 6.

Biyth's Eeed- Warbler breeds, I believe, for the most part along
the course of the streams of the lower Himalayan and sub-Hima-
layan ranges, and in suitable localities on and about these ranges ;
such at least is my present idea. They are with us in the plains
up to quite the end of March, and are back again by the last day
of August, and during May at any rate they may be heard and
seen everywhere in the valleys south of the first snowy range.

Mr. Brooks remarks that " this species was excessively common
on the Hindoostan side of the Pir-pinjal Range, but I have never
seen it in Cashmere. I think it breeds in the low valleys by the
river-sides, for it was in very vigorous song there at the end of
May." This is my experience also, and probably while many may
go north to Central Asia to breed, a good many remain in the
localities indicated.

Captain Hutton says : — "This species arrives in the hills up to

7000 feet at least, in April, when it is very common, and appears

in pairs with something of the manner of a Phylkscopus. The

note is a sharp tchick, tckick, resembling the sound emitted by a

- flint and steel. .

" It disappears by the end of May, in which month they breed ;
but, owing to the high winds and strong weather experienced in
that month in 1848, many nests were left incomplete, and the
birds mti&t have departed without breeding.

" One nest, which I took on the 6th May, was a round ball with
a lateral entrance ; it was placed in a thick barberry-bush growing
at the side of a deep and sheltered ditch ; it was composed of
coarse dry grasses externally and lined with finer grass. Eggs
three and pearl-white, with minute scattered specks of rufous,
chiefly at the larger end. Diameter 0-62 by 0'5."

The late Mr. A. Anderson wrote the following note :— " On the