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 busy at its nest.

This species spends most of its life in shady gardens; it feeds on insects in preference to fish.  It does not invariably select a river bank in which to nest, it is quite content with a sand quarry, a bank, or the shaft of a kachcha well.  The nest consists of a passage, some two feet in length and three inches in diameter, leading to a larger chamber in which from four to seven eggs are laid.

A pair of white-breasted kingfishers at work during the early stages of nest construction affords an interesting spectacle.  Not being able to obtain a foothold on the almost perpendicular surface of the bank, the birds literally charge this in turn with fixed beak.  By a succession of such attacks at one spot a hole of an appreciable size is soon formed in the soft sand.  Then the birds are able to obtain a foothold and to excavate with the bill, while clinging to the edge of the hole.  Every now and then they indulge in a short respite from their labours.  While thus resting one of the pair will sometimes spread its wings for an instant and display the white patch; then it will close them and make a neat bow, as if to say “Is not that nice?” Its companion may remain motionless and unresponsive, or may return the compliment.