Mr. Blyth remarked in 'The Ibis' (1867) that this species was "surely a Trochalopteron rather than a Garrulax," and the eggs seem to confirm this view. These are long, cylindrical ovals, very obtuse even at the smaller end. They are about the same size as those of Garrulax albigularis, with a very delicate pale blue ground and little or no gloss. One egg is spotless; the other has a few chocolate-brown specks or spots towards the large end. They measure 1·18 by 0·86 and 1·25 by 0·85.
80. Ianthocincla rufigularis, Gould. The Rufous-chinned Laughing-Thrush.
Trochalopteron rufogulare (Gould), Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 47; Hume,
Rough Draft N. & E. no. 421.
Common as this species is about Simla, I have never yet secured the nest, and know nothing certain about the eggs.
Captain Hutton says:—"This species appears usually in pairs, sometimes in a family of four or five. It breeds in May, in which month I took a nest, at about 6500 feet elevation, in a retired and wooded glen; it was composed of small twigs externally and lined with the fine black fibres of lichens. The nest was placed on a horizontal bough, about 7 feet from the ground, and contained three pure white eggs. Size 1·12 by 0·69; shape ordinary. The stomach of the old bird contained sand, seed, and the remains of wasps."
One egg that I possess of this species I owe to Captain Hutton, and it is of the Pomatorhinus type—a long oval, slightly pointed pure white egg, with but little gloss, measuring 1·08 by 0·75.
From Sikhim a nest, said to belong to this species, has been recently sent me. It was found below Darjeeling in July, and was placed in a double fork of the branchlets of a medium-sized tree. It is a moderately deep cup, composed almost entirely of dry, coarser and finer, tendrils of creepers, and is lined with a some black moss-roots and a few scraps of dead leaves. It contained three fresh eggs.
Numerous nests of this species subsequently sent me from Sikhim are all of the same type, all moderately deep cups composed entirely of creeper-tendrils, the cavity only being lined with fine black roots. They appear from the specimens before me to be quite sui generis and unlike those of any of its congeners. No grass, no dead leaves, no moss seems to be employed; nothing but the tendrils of some creeper. The nests appear to be always placed at the fork, where three, four, or more shoots diverge, and to be generally more or less like inverted cones, measuring say 4 to 5 inches in height, and about the same in breadth at the top, while the cavities are about 3 inches in diameter and 1·5 to 2 in depth. The nests appear to have been found at very varying heights from the ground from 5 to 15 feet, and at elevations of from 3000 to 5000 feet. They appear to have contained three fresh or more or less incubated eggs.
The eggs were found in Sikhim on different dates between 25th May and 8th September.
Exceptional as the coloration of the eggs of this species may seem, there is no doubt that they are pure white. The shell is thin and fragile, but has generally a decided gloss, and the eggs are typically elongated ovals, obtuse-ended, and more or less pyriform or cylindrical. The eggs vary from 0·92 to 1·13 in length, and from 0·75 to 0·8 in breadth, but the average of eleven eggs is 1·06 by 0·77 nearly.