Malurus gouldii and Maliiriis cyaneus. 63 



year, because Mr. Graham and I have carefully tested two dis- 

 tricts, in which Af. cyaneus and M. goidiii are separately to be 

 found, and we find 99% of the wrens are brown by the end of 

 summer, the remaining 1% being "blue." Then, as to observing 

 an immature bird going through the stage of rearing young, I 

 have some doubt, because of the regular attention one brood of 

 young gets from 2 — 3 adult males as mentioned in the part 

 following on nidification. Such an immature bird could easily 

 be one of these three. Besides, I do not believe a female wren 

 would mate with a half liveried male. In the bird referred to 

 below as that under domestication, the young male actually did 

 assume half a blue dress in its first spring. It went no nearer 

 to maturity, and moulted it in the following autumn. 



I do not think there is throughout our continent a bird that 

 has hoodwinked us more or has made more champions " for and 

 against " an annual change in its life-history than the blue wren. 

 Without doubt I consider the annual double moult of the male 

 wren to be now an established fact as contended for by 

 Mr. Gould in the first place, but in a fuller sense by the follow- 

 ing original observations. 



The species specially chosen by myself is M. gou/dii, a repre- 

 sentative of the blues, which I judge by analogy, will embrace a 

 moult of the bright feathers in all the other " black-backed," if 

 not the " red-backed " section as well. 



B. Birds at large. 



That the male moults its blue coat once in a year is proved 

 in the following, not only by many specimens procured and 

 preserved, but by a bird in captivity. That the male dons its 

 "blue" either in autumn or spring I find demonstrated in the 

 skins procured. 



Moulting processes takes place in : — 



A.. "Blues" falling from late summer to the first of autumn. 



B. "Browns" falling in (//) — Early autumn. 



(^")— Spring. 



In the autumn none but singing birds are afiected, the young 



still holding their little cliirps and their brownish bills and legs. 



I have skins of male birds developing their nuptial plumage in 



April, May, July, August, and on to Oct. 2oth. The spring is the 



