60 PTILOSORIIVNCHID.E. 



favoured me with the following notes : — " There are numbers of Guttated Bower-birds in 

 most parts of Central Australia I have visited. Those close to Illamurta are very destructive 

 in the garden, eating principally the tomatoes, and ha\e become \ery cunning. One can hear 

 them s(iuealing and chattering at the spring, but on approaching it tiiev are silent, and remain 

 so until one leaves the spot. Two were shot by one of the boys stopping in a 'wurley' we made 

 there for that purpose. They are great mimics, and imitate the notes of Poinafostvmiis siipcriiltosiis 

 and other birds very closely. The bowers are formed of small twigs and cane grass, built upon 

 a platform of the same materials, five or six inches in depth, and trodden perfectly flat. Those 

 I have seen when travelling were decorated chiefly with land-shells, pieces of bone, different 

 berries according; to the season, and a few bright coloured feathers." 



Mr. Cowle has sent me a sketch of an unusually large and most remarkably formed bower. 

 It is nearly seven feet in length, and in the centre on one side of it, at right angles, has another 

 similar structure, three feet in length, opening into the main a\fnuc or run. Rewrites: — 

 "When we first came here, this bower — about one hundred \ards Irom the spring — was a 

 meeting-place for the Bower-birds; now it is deserted, and only the remains of it are left. It is 

 situated in mallee scrub at the foot of a myrtle-bush, whose low spreading sticks with 

 many leafy branchlels practically cover the entire structure. The shajje is like enclosed 

 sketch, with the runs gradually sloped from the three entrances to the centre, which is slightly 

 more elevated than the remainder. The walls are made of small twigs and cane grass, the run 

 between being irregular and varying from ten inches to a foot in width. When occupied by 

 the birds the decorations varied a lot, but consisted chiefly of bleached snail-shells (generally 

 plentiful under big tussocks of Triodia mttchclli), and small bones of mammals and birds. The 

 entrances to the runs were spread over with berries of the Fig (Finis polypoda). Native Quan- 

 dong ( Sciiitiihiin Icinifoliiliitii), and of a species of whitewood. Later on, after our advent, pieces 

 of glass, odd nails, and bits of bright tin, were intermingled with the other ornaments. Some- 

 times the shells and berries would be arranged along the runs or on the sides of them. The 

 traffic of the stock, howev'er, going in and out of the scrub, hunted the birds away, and I ha\e 

 not .seen any other bower near here." 



Mr. Keartland informs me that he saw this remarkable structure when in Central Australia 

 with the Horn Scientific lixpedition in 1894. 



Ever since the return of this Expedition, Mr. Keartland urged his many friends in Central 

 .Vustraiia to try and discover the nest and eggs of tliis species. Bearing on this subject are the 

 following interesting notes received by him from Mr. Cowle: — " Relative to Chlamydodcra ffiittatit, 

 I do not for one moment think that the blacks have any objection to finding and robbing these 

 birds' nests, for they must have slaugiitered over twenty Bower-birds here for me about the 

 garden ; one of the older blacks, who would be more likely to be careful, got five in one day. 

 I believe I found one of their nests during our last trip. We were having dinner on the 28th 

 October, 1898, in one of the valleys south of Mareena Blufl, and got a young Bower-bird just 

 able to fly. It was in one of those scrubby mulgas that throw out so many branches right from 

 the ground. Near the top of this tree, in a clump of silvery-whitish mistletoe, which you must 

 often have noticed up here — not the drooping viscid-leafed one — was an open nest which 

 contained minute frafjments of egg-shell and dried up yolk, which convinced me at least that 

 one egg had been broken. The nest was constructed of a few dry black cotton-bush tops and 

 was loosely lined with coarse dried grass-stalks. Externally it measured eight inches in 

 diameter, and internally about four inches and a half. \'iewed from fielow, the nest would 

 be taken for an unfinished one not worthy of inspection, and I was particularly struck 

 by the amount of ventilation in it when I had it in my hand. Tiie black-boys who were 

 with me were certain it was a Bower-bird's, but I was doubtful if they had seen one 

 before." 



