NESTS AXD EGGS Oh' AV ST KALIAN BIRDS. 



37 



Tho two clutches of eggs kindly presented to me while iu Western 

 Australia contained each a complement of three eggs, while one was taken 

 from a nest built on the crown of a gi-ass-tree. Another nest I mj-self 

 foimd was situated iu a beautiful-lcafcd eucalypt {E. cahiphi/lla), 

 locally known as the red giun-trce. Tlie bird was sitting, but the nest 

 was inaccessible except to such expert climbers as the Messrs. Barnard. 



Near Point Cloates (Western Australia), Mr. Tom Carter, one Sep- 

 tember, took the unusual munber of iive eggs from a nest. He has 

 taken eggs of the Western Brown Hawk in the same district as early 

 as the middle of July. 



Breeding months from July to November. 



27. — HiEu.\ciDE.v ORiENT.\MS, Schlegel. — (11) 

 H. herigora, Gould. 



BROWN HAWK. 



Figure. — Gould : Birds of Australia, fol., vol. i., pi. ii. 



Reference. — Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., vol. i., p. 422. 



Previous Description of Eggs.— Gou\d: Birds of .Australia (1848), also 

 Handbook, vol i . p. 32 {1865) ; North; Austn. Mus. Cat, p. 20, 

 pi. 3, fig. 2 (1889); Campbell: Proc. Austn. Assoc, vol. vi., 

 p. 440(1895). 



Geographical Dintribiition. — Whole of Australia and Tasmania. 



Nest. — Constructed of sticks and twigs, Uned with leaves, strips of 

 baa'k, <tc., and usually situated iu the forked brandies of a tall tree, 

 sometimes on bushes in the interior. Dimensions over all, 27 inches by 

 12 inches in depth; egg caA-ity, 8 inches across by 4 inches deep. 

 Frequently another Hawk's or Raven's old nest is iised. 



Eggs. — Clutch, two to tliree, sometimes four ; generally round 

 oval in shape, more or less compressed towards one end ; texture 

 of shell somewhat fine, but lustreless. There is much variation 



in the appearance of different sets, even examples in the same nests 

 differing. A common type has a buffy-white grotmd-colotu', speckled and 

 blotched with reddish-brown, the markings increasing in number towards 

 the larger end, where they form a dark confluent patch. Another pair 

 has the ground colour almost obscured by freckles and small markings of 

 dark red or purplish-brown, Avith a darker patch on the large end of one 

 specimen, and one on the smaller end of the other example. Again, 

 another type is freckled and mottled over the entire surface with light 

 reddish-brown. Dimensions in inches, namely: — Of a large pair taken 

 in Queensland (1) 2-2 x 1-56, (2) 2-18 x 1-55 ; of an average pair taken 

 in Victoria (1) 2-14 x 1-53, (2) 2-1 x 1-57 ; of a small pair- (selected) 

 (1) 2-06 X 1-18, (2) 1-97 x 1-45. (Plate 4.) 



Observations. — There is probably no bird of prey so frequently seen 

 thi-oughout Australia and Tasmania as the common Brown Hawk. Its 

 name describes its plumage, which is brownish in colour, with perhaps 



