Hierococcyx varius (Vahl). 
The Common Hawk - Cuckoo.

Hierococcyx varius (Vahl), Jerd. B. Ind. i, p. 329; Hume, Cat. no. 205.

Mr. Iver Macpherson writes from Mysore : -" I send you an egg which I believe to be that of this bird.

"There can, I think, be no doubt that this Cuckoo selects the nests of Grateropus griseus and G. canorus to deposit its eggs in. In June 1878 I found a nest of the latter with one young bird almost fully fledged and nearly filling up the whole nest. It was certainly not a Babbler, and I don't know what other bird it could have been, if not this Cuckoo.

"Towards the end of last June Major McInroy, at Hunsur, found a nest of G. griseus with five hard - set eggs, which he left. On returning to it a few days after he found one young bird only in the nest. At intervals of a few days he paid two other visits to the nest, and was quite convinced in his mind that the solitary inmate of it was H. varius. Unfortunately he left for England before the bird was fully grown.

"The egg I send you was found in the nest of Crateropus canorus. The nest altogether contained five eggs; four of the usual size of those of C. canorus, the fifth was this large egg."

Mr. E. Aitken remarks :   -  " I later got an egg of Hierococcyx varius, also in a nest of Argya malcolmi, which had even a thicker shell than those of G. jacobinus, and a more highly coloured albumen. I see no mention of this bird in ' Nests and Eggs.' The egg I send you is an undoubted one. I compared it with one Bingham had which he took out of a H. varius he shot in his compound in the N. I. lines here, and it was at once recognized by Capt. Cock': it is very deep in colour."

The eggs are rather elongated, rather cylindrical ovals, very blunt at both ends. The shell is fine and glossy. The colour is a uniform, rather dark greenish blue. They are larger, more elongated, and darker coloured than those of C. jacobinus.

Another egg supposed to belong to this species is a moderately elongated oval, rather obtuse at both ends, highly glossy, and of a rather pale greenish blue.

Four eggs supposed to be of this species measure from 0.95 to 1.15 in length by 0.75 to 0.82 in breadth.