SOUTH AUSTRALIAN EXPLORATIONS 



361 



Australian and Tasmanian birds, cs- used as pack animals on these expedi- 

 pecialh- the marine and other water tions, led by native drivers. Nearly 

 species. twenty of these have now been success- 

 Doctor Leach has written a great fully conducted through untold dan- 

 deal about the ornithology of that ])art gers, back to Adelaide, laden with 



FIG. 2. EGGS AND "NEST" OF BLACK-BREASTED PLOVER (ZONIFER TRICOLOR). 

 Photograph by Captain White on his own estate Considerably reduced. 



of the world ; he is editor of The Emu, 

 which is the official organ of the Aus- 

 tralasian Ornithologists' Union, an or- 

 ganization that corresponds to our 

 American Ornithologists' Union. Some 

 of the members of the former are Hon- 

 orarv or Corresponding members of the 

 latter. As a matter of fact, the ornitho- 

 logists of Australia take the greatest 

 interest in all the publications and do- 

 ings of our Union ; and, personally, I 

 am just as much interested in the orni- 

 thology of that far-off country as I am 

 in that of my own. In Australia there 

 are nearly forty parrots and their near 

 allies, to our single and nearly extinct 

 Carolina parroquet. 



To return to Captain White's work, 

 I may say that he has described quite 

 a number of new Australian birds of 

 recent years not to mention a good 

 many other forms new to science, and 

 to that great Continent. Nearly every 

 year he is the senior naturalist and 

 ethnologist connected with the splendid 

 scientific expeditions that are formed 

 in Adelaide, moving from there north- 

 ward and westward for miles and miles 

 into the almost entirely unknown coun- 

 try beyond. Some twenty camels are 



quantities of new material of all de- 

 scriptions. Captain White publishes 

 accounts of these expeditions in the 

 transactions of the Royal Society of 

 Adelaide, and subsequently in exten- 

 isive and popular booklets for the 

 people. Three of these intensely inter- 

 esting publications are before me, and 

 any one of them fills me with the desire 

 to join the next party going out to the 

 "Ranges." 



Not only are all sorts of new creat- 

 ures and plants discovered, but entirely 

 new races of people, heretofore not 

 known to the world at all. I wish I 

 could give some of the remarkable hab- 

 its and customs of these strange men 

 and women ; but that I can not well do 

 at present. It is my intention to do so 

 later on, for then I shall have the pho- 

 tographs of many of them, which Cap- 

 tain White posted me by the last mail 

 leaving Adelaide. Not long ago I pub- 

 lished quite a full account of these ex- 

 peditions {Science, Dec. I, 1916, p. 793), 

 and that account might be read with 

 profit, in connection with what I have 

 set forth here. To tell the truth, I was 

 much surprised to note the great inter- 

 est taken in the subject in this country 



