NESTS AXD EaCS 01- AUSTRALIAN PIKDS. 2<St; 



great Gould novor saw but one specimen.* and it is seldom seen by tiic 

 general traveller, it is so essentially <a bird of the interior. It is the 

 bird gem of the desert (its elegant siiape. its lively manners, its beautiful- 

 coloured scarlet, brown and white pkunage making such a striking 

 contrast, that its name of /ri>«/or is at once seen to bo most appropriate). 

 I don't know why, but from the first tune I .saw Gould's fine picture of 

 this beautiful bird and road his meagre description of it, I burned to 

 possess it. to SCO it in it-s native haunts, to discover all about it. What 

 a glorious thing is the untamed ardoiu- of youth ! What a little it 

 makes of a difficulty if a hobby is to be gratified ! And I really believe 

 it was the thought of seeing this bird that sent me years ago out into 

 what was then a dry, inhospitable region, imknown and untaken up by 

 squatter — I mean the north-east comer of South Australia. I was 

 really looking for available sheep country, but I determined to find out 

 all about this bird as well. Imagine my intense delight when one d.iy 

 I saw a whole flock of them flitting before me ; and moreover, it did not 

 take mc long to notice that they were actually nesting. Here wa.s a 

 prize indeed, to find the nest and eggs of what was (then) admitted to 

 bo one of the rarest, if not the rarest, birds in the whole countiy. Great 

 was my pleasiu-e when I found that almost every salt-bush had a nest 

 in it, and I soon collected as many eggs as I could pack. Unfortunately, 

 through the \'icissitudes of outside travelling, they all got broken and 

 lost before I again returned to civilisation. " 



Tlic late Mr. Gregory Bateman, a trapper who had observed many 

 nests both of the Tricoloured and Orange-fronted Chats, informed mc, 

 with regard to the former bird, that on one occasion he found on a 

 plain, within a radius of twenty yards, three nests containing eggs, 

 Vniilt in thistles, although other bushes were convenient. 



I should have mentioned that this bird is a partial migrant, 

 appearing in Riverina generally in spring. In We.stera Australia 

 (Point Cloatcs) it is common amongst the smaller kinds. On one 

 occasion several of these beautifid birds were found drowned in a hor,se 

 trough. Mr. Carter tells me the Tricoloured Chat sometimes builds its 

 nest on the top of a bunch of spinifex, and that he has noticed eggs in 

 March and July, according to the seasonal rains. 



232. — Ephthianura aurifrons, Gould. — (232) 



ORANGE-FRONTED BUSH CHAT. 



Figure. — Gould : Birds of Australia, fol., vol. iii , pi 65 



Reference.— Ca.t. Birds Brit Mus . vol. vii , p 668. 



Previous Descriptions of Eggs. — Gould : Birds of Australia. Handbook, 



vol. i., p. 380 (1865) ; Ramsay: Proc. Linn See, NS Wales, 



vol. vii,, p. 48 (1832). 



Geographical Diitrihutinn. — South Queensland (interior probably). 

 New South Wales, Victoria, South, West, and North-west Australia. 



• A fine male specimen which he himself shot while traversing, soon after sunrise 

 on the nth December, 1839, the forest lands near Peel River, to the eastward of 

 Liverpool Plains, and which became the type. 



