[Footnote A: I fear I may have made a mistake in identifying the nest referred to. With this caution, however, I allow my note to stand.—ED.]
This egg appears to me to be an abnormally small one. A nest sent me from Sikhim, where it was found in July, contained much larger eggs, and more in proportion to the size of the bird. The nest I refer to was placed in a clump of bamboos about 5 feet from the ground. It was a tolerably compact, moderately deep, saucer-shaped nest, between 6 and 7 inches in diameter, composed of dead bamboo-sheaths and leaves bound together with creepers and herbaceous stems, and thinly lined with roots. It contained two eggs. These are rather broad ovals, somewhat pointed towards one end, of a uniform pale greenish blue, and are fairly glossy.
These eggs measured 1·33 and 1·30 in length, and 0·98 in breadth.
Mr. Mandelli sent me two nests of this species, both taken in Native Sikhim, the one on the 4th, the other on the 20th July. Each contained two fresh eggs. One was placed in a small tree in heavy jungle, at a height of about 6 feet from the ground, the other in a clump of bamboos a, foot lower. Both are large, coarse, saucer-shaped nests, 7 to 8 inches in diameter, and 3·5 to 4 in height externally; the cavities are about 4·5 inches in diameter, and less than 2 in depth; the basal portion of the nests is composed entirely of dry leaves, chiefly those of the bamboo, loosely held together by a few stems of creepers; the sides of the nest are stems of creepers wound round and round and loosely intertwined, and the cavity is lined with rather coarse rootlets, and in one case with fine twigs.
73. Garrulax moniliger (Hodgs.). The Necklaced Laughing-Thrush.
Garrulax moniliger (Hodgs.) Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 40; Hume, Rough
Draft N. & E. no. 413.
Of the Necklaced Laughing-Thrush Dr. Jerdon says:—"I procured both this and the last (the Black-gorgeted Laughing-Thrush) at Darjeeling, and have also seen one or both in Sylhet, Cachar, and Upper Burmah. They both associate in large flocks, and frequent more open forest than most of the previous species. The eggs are greenish blue."
From Sikhim, Mr. Gammie writes:—"In the first week of June I found a nest in low jungle, at 2000 feet, containing four greenish-blue eggs, but, as I did not see the bird, left it until my return a week later. I then saw the female, but in the interval the young had been hatched. The nest closely resembled that of D. caerulatus [p. 46], both in shape and composition, and was similarly situated between several upright slender shoots to which it was firmly attached. It was, however, within five feet of the ground, which is lower by 5 feet or so than D. caerulatus generally builds.
"I have found this species breeding from April to June, up to elevations not much exceeding 2500 feet. It affects the low, dense scrub growing in moist situations, and usually fixes its nest between several upright sprays, within 5 or 6 feet of the ground. The nest is cup-shaped, made of dry bamboo-leaves, intermixed with a very few pieces of climber-stems, and thickly lined with old leaf-stalks of some pinnate-leaved tree. Externally it measures about 5·5 inches in diameter by 4 in height; internally 3·5 by 2·75.
"The eggs are four or five in number."