, 7000 feet."

Captain Cock says:--"I found a nest in the stump of an old
chestnut-tree at Murree. The nest was about 13 feet from the ground
near the top of the stump, placed in a natural cavity: it was
constructed of fine grass and roots carefully woven and was of a deep
cup shape. It contained five fully fledged young ones. The end of May
was the time when I found this, and I have never yet succeeded in
finding another."

261. Psaroglossa spiloptera (Vigors). _The Spotted-wing_.

Saroglossa spiloptera (_Vig.), Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 336; _Hume, Rough
Draft N. & E._ no. 691.

Personally I know nothing of the nidification of the Spotted-wing.

Captain Hutton tells us that "this species arrives in the hills about
the middle of April in small parties of five or six, but it does
not appear to ascend above 5500 to 6000 feet, and is therefore more
properly an inhabitant of the warm valleys. I do not remember seeing
it at Mussoorie, which is 6500 to 7000 feet, although at 5200 feet on
the same range it is abundant during summer. Its notes and flight are
very much those of the Starling (_Sturnus vulgaris_), and it delights
to take a short and rapid flight and return twittering to perch on the
very summit of the forest trees. I have never seen it on the ground,
and its food appears to consist of berries.

"Like the two species of _Acridotheres_, it nidificates by itself in
the holes of trees, lining the cavity with bits of leaves. The eggs
are usually three, or sometimes four or five, of a delicate pale
sea-green speckled with blood-like stains, which sometimes tend to
form a ring near the larger end; shape oval, slightly tapering."

The eggs are so different in character from those of all the Starlings
that doubts might reasonably arise as to whether this species is
placed exactly where it ought to be by Jerdon and others. I possess at
present only three eggs of this bird, which I owe to Captain Hutton.
They are decidedly long ovals, much pointed towards the small end,
and in shape and coloration not a little recall those of _Myiophoneus
temmincki_. The eggs are glossless, of a greenish or greyish-white
ground, more or less profusely speckled and spotted with red, reddish
brown, and dingy purple. In two of the eggs the majority of the
markings are gathered into a broad irregular speckled zone round the
large end. In the third egg there is just a trace of such a zone and
no markings at all elsewhere. In length they va