nish-purple spots and
streaks. I have not yet seen one egg of either species that could be
mistaken for one of the other, although of course abnormal varieties
of each approach each other more closely than do the typical forms.

The dozen eggs that I possess of this species vary from 1.1 to 1.2 in
length, and from 0.78 to 0.87 in breadth, and the average is 1.14
by 0.82. Although the average is somewhat larger than that of the
preceding species, and although none of the eggs are quite _as_ small
as many of those of _O. kundoo_, still none are nearly so large as the
finest specimens of the latter's egg. Probably had I an equally large
series of the eggs of the present species, we should find that as
regards size there was no perceptible difference between the two.

522. Oriolus traillii (Vigors). _The Maroon Oriole_.

Oriolus traillii (_Vig._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 112; _Hume, cat._
no. 474.

From Sikhim Mr. Gammie writes:--"I took a nest of this Oriole on the
24th April, at an elevation of about 2500 feet. It was suspended,
within ten feet of the ground, from an outer fork of a branch of a
small leafy tree, which grew in a patch of low dense jangle. It is a
neat cup, composed of fibrous bark and strips of the outer part of dry
grass-stems, intermixed with skeletonized leaves and green moss, and
lined with fine grass. Besides being firmly bound by the rim of the
cup to the horizontal forking branches by fibrous barks, several
strings extended from one branch to the other, both under and in
front of the nest, while other strings from the body of the nest were
fastened to an upright twig that rose immediately behind the fork,
thus most securely retaining it in its position.

"Externally the nest measured 5 inches wide by 2.75 in height;
internally 3.25 wide by 2 deep. It contained three fresh eggs.

"The female came quite close, making loud complaints against the
robbing of her nest."

The nest is that of a typical Oriole, usually very firmly and
substantially built, and of course always suspended at a fork between
two twigs. A nest taken by Mr. Gammie in Sikhim on the 20th April, at
an elevation of about 2500 feet, is a deep substantial cup, nearly 4
inches in diameter and 21/2 in depth internally. It is everywhere nearly
an inch in thickness. The suspensory portion composed of vegetable
fibres; towards the exterior dead leaves, bamboo-sheaths, green
moss, and tendrils of creeping plants are profusely intermin