332 LAKTIDJS.

note on the nidification of the Malabar Wood-Shrike :—" I took
the nest of this bird on April 13th, 1875. It was composed of
fine roots and fibres, neatly woven into a shallow cup-like nest,
secured to the fork of a horizontal bough and fixed in its place
with cobweb, and covered externally with lichen corresponding to
that on the bough. It measured 4-2 inches in diameter externally,
and 2-4 internally and '7 deep. Both parent birds were shot.
The eggs two in number, rather round, coloured white with faint
inky and brown spots."

One of these eggs is a very regular oval, the shell fine but gloss-
less, the ground-colour white, with a faint greenish tinge ; round
the large end is a pretty conspicuous zone of black or blackish-brown
and pale inky purple spots and small blotches, and similar spots and
blotches of the same colour are somewhat sparsely scattered
over the rest of the surface of the egg. The egg measured 0-98
by 0-73.

488. Tephrodornis pondicerianus (Gkn.). T7ie Common
Wood-Shrike.

Tephrodornis pondiceriana (Gm.), Jerd. B. Ind. i, p. 410 j Hume,
Rough Draft N. $ JE. no. 265.

The Common Wood-Shrike lays during the latter half of March
and April. This at least is, I think, the normal season, but Mr.
W. Blewitt found a nest at Hansee on the 2nd of June containing
two fresh eggs.

I have only taken one nest myself (though I have had many
others sent me), and that was on the 2nd of April at Chundowah
in Jodpoor, Eajpootana. The nest was in the fork of a ber tree
(Zizyphus jujuba), on a small horizontal bough, about 5 feet from
the ground. It was a broad shallow7 cup, somewhat oval interiorly,
with the materials very compactly and closely pat together. The
basal portion and framework of the sides consisted of very fine
stems of some herbaceous plant about the thickness of an ordinary
pin. It was lined with a little wool and a quantity of silky fibre;
exteriorly it was bound round with a good deal of the same fibre
and pretty thickly felted with cobwebs. The egg-cavity measured
2-5 inches in diameter one way and only 2 the other way, while in
depth it was barely *86. The exterior diameter of the nest was
about 4 inches and the height nearly 2 inches. It contained three
fresh eggs, of a slightly greyish-white ground, very thickly spotted
and speckled with yellowish brown, dark umber-brown, and a pale
washed-out inky-purple. In all, the spots were thickest in a zone
round the large end, where they became more or less confluent.
I have, however, a large series of these nests, and taking them as
a whole, although much more massive, they remind one no libtle of
those of EJiipidura alUfrontata and Terpsiphone paradisi and even
JEyi.thina tipJiia. They are broad shallow cups, measuring internally
2| inches across and about •§- inch in depth. They are placed in a