e North-West Provinces and Oudh,
Behar, and Central Bengal, the greater portion of the Central
Provinces, and the Punjab and Sindh. Adams says it does not _occur_ in
the Punjab; but, as Colonel C.H.T. Marshall correctly pointed out to
me years ago, and I have verified the facts, it breeds about Lahore
and many other places, and in the high banks of the Beas, the Sutlej,
the Jhelum, and the Indus, congregating in large numbers on these
rivers just as it does on the Jumna or the Ganges.

It builds exclusively, so far as my experience goes, in earthen banks
and cliffs, in holes which it excavates for itself, always, I think,
in close proximity to water, and by preference in places overhanging
or overlooking running water.

The breeding-season lasts from the middle of April to the middle of
July, but I have found more eggs in May than in any other month.

Four is the usual number of the eggs; I have found five, but never
more. If Theobald got seven or eight, they belonged to two pairs; and
the nests so run into each other that this is a mistake that might
easily be made, even where coolies were digging into the bank before
one.

There is really no variety in their nesting arrangements, and a note
I recorded in regard to one colony that I robbed will, I think,
sufficiently illustrate the subject. All that can be said is that very
commonly they nest low down in earthy cliffs, where it is next to
impossible to explore thoroughly their workings, while in the instance
referred to these were very accessible:--

"One morning, driving out near Bareilly, we found that a colony of the
Bank Myna had taken possession of some fresh excavations on the banks
of a small stream. The excavation was about 10 feet deep, and in its
face, in a band of softer and sandier earth than the rest of the bank,
about a foot below the surface of the ground, these Mynas had bored
innumerable holes. They had taken no notice of the workman who had
been continuously employed within a few yards of them, and who
informed us that the Mynas had first made their appearance there only
a month previously. On digging into the bank we found the holes all
connected with each other, in one place or another, so that apparently
every Myna could get into or out from its nest by any one of the
hundred odd holes in the face of the excavation. The holes averaged
about 3 inches in diameter, and twisted and turned up and down, right
and left, in a wonderful manner; each h