The History of the Biidgcrl^or. 69 



him in this, I presume we shall never know, but in the ab- 

 sence of evidence to ihe contrary the honour remains ("/ould's. 

 One wonders also whether by any chance the bird had been 

 bred in captivity in its native country before this was achieved 

 in Europe, but this is improbable, for Au-tralia in those days 

 was not a likely place for the peaceful cult of foreij^n birds. 



Although this import trade grew rapidly, it was not 

 till about the time (184S) of the appearance of Gould's des- 

 cription in the fifth volume of the Birds of Australia that the 

 bird became widely known, and we find a writer in 1843 

 (Selby in vol. xviii of Jardine's Naturalist's Library) lament- 

 ing how little was then known about the bird, and cjbviously 

 ignorant of Gould's importation. His name for the bird is the 

 1 ndulalod Nanodeg and he v/rites (p, 201) as follows: 



" Its habits and moth' of life are supposed to res?mblL' those of its 

 " congeners, but we unfortunately possess too little infurmalion ui)t)ii 

 " these interesting points, the skins we receive from abroad being mostly 

 " collected by persons who take no other interest in the pursuit except 

 " the mere acquisition of the bird, are rarely accompanied by any notes 

 " 01 observations illustrative of the natural history of the species they 



b( lolli; to." 



Its appearance in actual cage-bird literature was some- 

 what delayed, for in Bechstein's Cage and Chamber Birds, even 

 in an English edition as late as 1853, it is not even men- 

 tioned, tliough by then i; mu -t l.ave been fairly well-known, as 

 only two years later (1855) according to Russ. vol. iii., p. 

 48, the first young were bred in captivity in Berlin by the 

 Grafin von Schwerin. 1 suppose we may take it that the first 

 breeder in Germany was the first breeder anywhere. 

 ( To be continued) . 



Correspondence. 



KARLV NE.STI.NG oK RKD (OI.LARED LORIKEETS. 



Sir, My Red-collared Lorikeets have nested again, since I came to 

 town, and have now two liabies about five weeks old, 



Edinburgh, r/^/'iO, Mi^M E. C. . i'EDDIE WADDKIL. 



BIRDS IN IHE EIRING LINE, 

 Sir, Somewliile ago 1 sent you a lew notes on the birds mi 



