Dr. Scully writes from Nepal:--"This Bulbul is common throughout the
year on the hills round the valley of Nepal, but never tenants the
central woods. It is generally found in bushes and bush trees, not in
high tree-forest; and is commonly seen in pairs. The breeding-season
appears to be May and June. A nest was taken on the 6th June, which
contained two fresh eggs. The nest was somewhat oval in shape,
measuring 3·35 inches in length and 2·5 across; the egg-cavity was
about 1 inch deep in the centre, and the bottom of the nest 1·25
thick. It was attached to a slender fork of a tree, and was composed
externally of ferns, dry leaves, roots, grass, and a little moss,
bound together with fine black hair-like fibres, which were wound
round the prongs of the fork so as regularly to suspend the nest like
an Oriole's. There was a regular lining, distinct from the body of the
nest, composed of fine long yellowish grass-stems, and a little cobweb
was spread here and there over the branches of the fork and the
outside of the nest. The eggs are rather long ovals, smaller at one
end, and fairly glossy; they measure 1·0 by 0·7, and 0·97 by 0·7. The
ground-colour is pure pinkish white, abundantly speckled and finely
spotted with reddish purple; the spots closely crowded together at the
large end, but not confluent, forming in one egg a broadish zone, and
in the other a cap; in the latter egg there are a few faint underlying
stains of purplish inky at the large end."
Two eggs sent me by Mr. Mandelli from Darjeeling, said to belong to
this species, are elongated ovals, much pointed towards the small
end. The shell is fine and fairly glossy; the ground-colour a dull
salmon-pink, and they are profusely and minutely freckled, speckled,
and streaked (so densely at the large end that the markings there are
almost confluent) with dull reddish purple.
The eggs measure 1·06 and 1·11 by 0·67.
277. Alcurus striatus (Bl.). _The Striated Green Bulbul_.
Alcurus striatus (_Bl._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 81.
Mr. Mandelli sent me a nest of this species which was found, he said,
on the 8th May about 4 feet from the ground amongst the foliage of a
kind of prickly bamboo growing out of the crevices of a patch of large
stones near Lebong (elevation 5000 feet), and contained two eggs
nearly ready to hatch. The nest is a shallow cup, about 3·75 inches in
diameter and 1·5 in height externally, composed entirely of fine brown
fibrous roots, a little bound together outside with wool and the silk
of cocoons and with two or three little bits of moss stuck about it,
and sparingly lined with hair-like grass. It is altogether a light
brown nest, no dark material being used in it at all. The cavity is
2·75 inches in diameter and about 1 deep.
278. Molpastes haemorrhous (Gm.). _The Madras Red-vented Bulbul_.
Pycnonotus haemorrhous (_Gm._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 94.
Molpastes pusillus (_Bl._), _Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._
no. 462.