e
almost confined to one end of the egg, generally the broad end.

These eggs vary much in size and in density of marking. The ordinary
dimensions are about 0.61 by 0.47, but in a large series they vary in
length from 0.57 to 0.72, and in breadth from 0.43 to 0.54. The
very large eggs, however, indicated by these _maxima_ are rare and
abnormal.

47. Lophophanes rufinuchalis (Bl.). _The Simla Black Tit_.

Lophophanes rufinuchalis (_Bl.). Jerd. B. Ind._ ii. p. 274.

Mr. Brooks informs us that this Tit is common at Derali and other
places of similar elevation. "I found a nest under a large stone in
the middle of a hill foot-path, up and down which people and cattle
were constantly passing; the nest contained newly-hatched young. This
was the middle of May."

Dr. Scully, writing of the Gilgit district, tells us that this Tit is
a denizen of the pine-forests, where it breeds.

Finally Captain Wardlaw Ramsay, writing in the 'Ibis,' states that
this Tit was breeding in Afghanistan in May.

Subfamily PARADOXORNITHINAE.

50. Conostoma aemodium, Hodgs. _The Red-billed Crow-Tit_.

Conostoma aemodium. _Hodgs., Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 10; _Hume, Rough
Draft N. & E._ no. 381.

A nest of the Red-billed Crow-Tit was sent me from Native Sikhim,
where it was found at an elevation of about 10,000 feet, in a cluster
of the small Ringal bamboo. It contained three eggs, two of which were
broken in blowing them.

The nest is a very regular and perfect hemisphere, both externally and
internally. It is very compactly made, externally of coarse grass and
strips of bamboo-leaves, and internally very thickly lined with stiff
but very fine grass-stems, about the thickness of an ordinary pin,
very carefully curved to the shape of the nest. The coarser exterior
grass appears to have been used when dry; but the fine grass, with
which the interior is so densely lined, is still green. It is the most
perfectly hemispherical nest I ever saw. Exteriorly it is exactly 6
inches in diameter and 3 in height; internally the cavity measures 4.5
in diameter and 2.25 in depth.

The egg is a regular moderately elongated oval, slightly compressed
towards the smaller end. The shell is fine and thin, and has only a
faint gloss. The ground-colour is a dull white, and it is sparsely
blotched, streaked, and smudged with pale yellowish brown, besides
which, about the large end, there are a number of small pale inky
purple spots and clouds, looking