The BAYA (_Nelicurvius Baya_), the most celebrated of the race, is of a dark brown upon the upper portion of its body, and all the feathers, particularly those of the wing and tail covers, are bordered with yellowish white; the breast is marked with light brown, the shafts of the feathers being of a deeper shade. The face and front of the throat are black, the top of the head bright yellow, and the primary quills edged with a narrow yellow line. The female is without the black and yellow upon the head, the eyebrows are pale, the breast and chin of a whitish shade. The winter coat of the adult male is like that of the female; in the young male the breast is pale red. The beak is horn colour, the iris brown, the feet flesh coloured, the eye dark blue. The length of this bird is six inches, and its breadth nine and a half inches; the wing measures two inches and four-fifths, and the tail two inches. This species is found extensively throughout India, Assam, Burmah, and the Malayan peninsula, frequenting woodlands in large numbers; it is much more rarely met with in the highlands of the Deccan. Corn, rice, and various kinds of grass-seeds constitute its principal food, but we have never been able to ascertain from our own observation that it will eat fruit. The Bayas breed during the rainy season, which occurs between April and September, according to the locality, and associate freely with other species. Their very curious nests, which in shape resemble a retort, are models of neat and compact architecture: these structures are generally hung from the branches of palms, or other trees, and in India we have never seen them elsewhere; in Burmah, on the contrary, it is not uncommon to find them suspended from the eaves of houses, or from the huts of the natives, some twenty or thirty in a row. On one occasion we observed not fewer than a hundred of these strange appendages hanging to the roof of one house, and the little occupants living on excellent terms with their human neighbours; it is, therefore, very remarkable that this same species in some places should occupy the most quiet and isolated situations, only visiting such districts as are but little frequented by man. The walls of the Baya's nest are composed of blades of grass, gathered while still green, or of strips of leaves, frequently those of the palm-tree, woven carefully together, the shape of the little edifice varying according to circumstances or the taste of its owner. As soon as the chamber allotted to the eggs is fully completed, the bird proceeds to build a partition wall, thus forming a second apartment, supposed by some naturalists to be the especial property of the male, whilst others imagine that it is only intended to separate the entrance passage from the cradle of the nestlings. The entrance is tubular, and is very strongly and firmly constructed, being destined to serve as the favourite sitting-room of the whole family, when the young birds have