G02 BIRDS OP AUSTRALIA. 



Sp. 308. CLIMACTERIS ERYTHROPS, Gould. 



Red-eyebrowed Tree-Creeper. 

 Climaderis erythrops, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc, part viii. p. 148. 



Climacteris erythrops, Gould, Birds of Australia, fol., vol. iv. pi. 95. 



I obtained this interesting species while encamped on the 

 low grassy hills under the Liverpool range ; but whether it 

 is generally distributed over the colony, or merely confined 

 to districts of a similar character to those in which I found 

 it, I had no opportunity of ascertaining. So far as I could 

 observe, its habits and manners bore a striking resemblance 

 to those of the Climacteris leucophoea. 



One singular feature connected with this species is the 

 circumstance of the female alone being adorned with the 

 beautiful radiated rufous markings on the throat, the male 

 having this part quite plain; a fact which I ascertained beyond a 

 doubt by the dissection of numerous specimens of both sexes ; 

 it is true that a faint trace of this character is observable both 

 in Climacteris scandens and C. rufa, but the present is the 

 only species of the genus in which this reversion of a general 

 law of nature is so strikingly apparent. 



The male has the .crown of the head blackish brown, each 

 feather margined with greyish brown ; lores and a circle 

 surrounding the eye reddish chestnut ; back brown ; sides of 

 the neck, lower part of the back, and upper tail-coverts grey ; 

 primaries blackish brown at the base and light brown at the 

 tip, all but the first crossed in the centre by a broad band of 

 buff, to which succeeds another broad band of blackish brown ; 

 two centre tail-feathers grey, the remainder blackish brown, 

 largely tipped with light grey ; chin dull white, passing into 

 greyish brown on the chest; the remainder of the under 

 surface greyish brown, each feather having a broad stripe of 

 dull white, bounded on either side with black running down 

 the centre, the lines becoming blended, indistinct, and tinged 



