CABIAN'US. 355 



a pale olive to grey, li,L;lit brown and dull j^reen more or less shaded with olive, and are typically 

 fairly evenly spotted and blotched all over with various shades of umber and brown, with which 

 are intermin,L;led fainter underlying marldngs of dull bluish or inky-grey ; a rarer type has the 

 outer spots and blotches of a brownish-black hue. On most specimens the markings are irreg- 

 ular in shape, in others they are more rounded in form, and freijuently both are found on the 

 same specimens, the irregular markings as a rule being fewer but larger, and most infrequently 

 assuming the form of a short longitudinal streak, or consist of small coalesced patches, or of one 

 colour partially overlying another. Rarely do the markings predominate, or are they conhned 

 to one end. A set of two in the Australian Museum Collection, taken by the late Mr. S. White 

 of Adelaide, measures: — Length (A) 2-82 x i-8g inches; (3)2-85 x 2 inches. A set of three, 

 taken by Dr. Lonsdale Holden, on the 12th December, 1886, on Long Point, Circular Head, 

 North-western Tasmania, measures: — Length (A) 2-85 x 2 inches; (B) 2-92 x 1-98 inches; (C) 

 2-97 X 2-2 inches; a set of three, taken by Mr. E. D. Atkinson, on the 23rd of November, 1890, 

 on Lister's Island, off the north-west coast of Tasmania, measures: — Length (.'\) 2-86 x 1-94 

 inches; (B) 2-92 x 2 inches; (C) 3 x i-g8 inches. Another set taken by Mr. Atkinson, on the 

 30th November, 1896, measures: — Length (A) 3-01 x 2-04 inches; (B) 3-02 x 1-95 inches; 

 (C) 3-03 X 1-98 inches. 



Young birds are brown above and below, with white bases to the feathers, giving them a 

 mottled appearance, chin whitish, face, head and upper-throat whitish streaked with brown ; 

 feathers on the crown of the head, nape, upper wing-coverts, scapulars and secondaries with 

 whitish margins, broader on the latter; primaries brownish-black, the inner web narrowly edged 

 with white around the tips; upper tail-coverts dull white with brown centres; tail-feathers 

 brownish-black, narrowly edged with white around the tips ; under tail coverts, dull white, 

 marked here and there on the apical portion of the larger ones with brown. Wing sixteen inches. 



October and the three following months constitute the usual breeding season. 



