The nesting season is at its height for all the other birds of which
the nests have been described, namely, most species of dove, the
jungle crow, the red-headed merlin, the purple sunbird, the nuthatch,
the fantail flycatcher, the finch-lark, the pied woodpecker, the
coppersmith, the alexandrine and the rose-ringed paroquet, the
white-eyed buzzard, the collared scops and the mottled wood-owl, the
kite, the black vulture and the pied kingfisher.

The sand-martins breed from October to May, consequently their nests,
containing eggs or young, are frequently taken in March. Mention was
made in January and February of the Indian cliff-swallow (_Hirundo
fluvicola_). This species is not found in the eastern districts of the
United Provinces, but it is the common swallow of the western
districts. The head is dull chestnut. The back and shoulders are
glistening steel-blue. The remainder of the upper plumage is brown.
The lower parts are white with brown streaks, which are most apparent
on the throat and upper breast. These swallows normally nest at two
seasons of the year--from February till April and in July or August.

They breed in colonies. The mud nests are spherical or oval with an
entrance tube from two to six inches long. The nests are invariably
attached to a cliff or building, and, although isolated ones are built
sometimes, they usually occur in clusters, as many as two hundred have
been counted in one cluster. In such a case a section cut parallel to
the surface to which the nests are attached looks like that of a huge
honeycomb composed of cells four inches in diameter--cells of a kind
that one could expect to be built by bees that had partaken of Mr. H.
G. Wells' "food of the gods."

The beautiful white-breasted kingfisher, (_Halcyon smyrnensis_) is now