ARTAMUS. 259 



The nest is a cup-shaped structure, irregularly formed externally of thin twigs, and neatly 

 lined inside with fibrous rootlets and grasses, an average one measuring externally four inches 

 and a half in diameter by three inches in depth, and the inner cup two inches and a half in 

 diameter by one inch and a half in depth. They are usually built within a few feet of the ground, 

 in a low bush or sapling, at a height varying from two to ten feet. At Narrabri, in November 

 1896, I found this species breeding in dead " Belar " trees (Casuarina glauca). Some of the nests 

 were in curled pieces of bark, hanging from the under sides of branches, others in thin forks, a 

 few being within hand-reach, while one was at an altitude of fully thirty feet. Most of the nests 

 I have examined in the neighbourhood of Sydney, principally at Belmore and Canterbury, 

 were built low down in gum saplings, tea-trees and turpentine-trees, and were composed chiefly 

 of green grasses. 



The eggs are two or three in number for a sitting, oval or thick oval in form, the shell being 

 close-grained, smooth and almost lustreless. They vary from a greyish-white to a light greenish- 

 grey, which is clouded and blotched with varying shades of brown, intermingled in some instances 

 with a few underlying spots of grey. As a rule the markings predominate on the thicker end, 

 where they assume the form of a cap or zone. A set of two taken at Belmore on the 12th 

 November, 1898, measures : — Length (A) 0-87 x 0-67 inches; (B) o-88 x o-68 inches. .V set 

 of three taken at Narrabri on the 9th November, i8g6, measures: — Length (A) 0-83 x o-56 

 inches; (B) 0-84 x 0'66 inches; (C) 0-84 x 0-65 inches. The eggs of this species, as a rule, 

 cannot be distinguished from those of the White-eyebrowed Wood Swallow {Artamns siiperciliosusj. 



October and the two following months constitute the usual breeding season of this species 

 in South-eastern Australia, nests and eggs being more often found in the neighbourhood of 

 Sydney during November and the early part of December ; but, near Port Augusta, Dr. Morgan 

 records finding a newly-made nest in September. Near Louth, in Western New South Wales, 

 Mr. Edward Lord Ramsay also found two nests with fresh eggs, one built in the hollow spout 

 of a Box-tree, on the nth September, and the other in a hollow stump of a broken off Mulga 

 on the 19th September, 1889. In the preceding year he obtained nests with fresh eggs as early 

 as the 28th August. In Western Australia Mr. C. G. Gibson procured fresh eggs also at the 

 end of August. 



On one occasion the late Mr. George Barnard, of Coomooboolaroo, Duaringa, Queensland, 

 found the male of Artamns siipeniliosus paired with the female of A. pcrsonatus. 



Artamus melanops. 



BLACK-FACED WOOD SWALLOW. 



Artamus melanops, Gould, Proc. Zoo). Soc, 1865, p. 198 ; id., Handbk. Bds. Austr., Vol. I., p. 149 

 (1865); id., Suppl. Bds. Aust., fol.. Vol. pi. 7 (1869); Sharpe, Cat. Bds. Brit. Mus., Vol. 

 XIII , p. 17 (1890) ; id., Hand-1. Bds., Vol. IV., p. 262 (1903). 



Adult male — General colour above hroimi passing into a greyislt-hroivn on the crown of the head; 

 rump and upper tail-coverts blackish; wings ashy, the quills and greater wing-coverts with paler 

 margins externally, whitish around their tips; two central tail-feathers black, the remainder black 

 largely tipped luith white; lores, base of forehead, feathers around the eye, cheeks, chin, and upper 

 throat blackish; remaiiider of under surface ashy-brown, paler on the foreneck, darker on tlie 

 abdomen; vent and under tail-coverts black, the latter often narrowly tipped with white; bill bluish 

 horn-colour, blackish at the tip; legs and feet grey; iris brown. Total length in the flesh 7-3 inches; 

 iving 4'9, tail 2'8, bill 0-6'2, tarsus 0-7o. 



