vo'ic^^f"] Reviews. 251 



So far we have had no official notification of the su|^f?ested 

 additions to the Wild Life Preservation, or the Gun License 

 Acts, but we believe that these acts when officially gazetted will 

 bring them in line with similar acts of the other States. 



It is our intention to arrange a series of lectures, illustrated 

 with lantern slides, and members of the affiliated societies who 

 are not already members of this Section are inxited to join uj) 

 and help to make the Section a big factor in furthering its 

 objects, i.e., to popularise and further the study and jjrotection 

 of our native birds. 



XEX'ILLK CAYLEV, 

 Hon. Secretarv of the Section and State Secretarv, R.A.O.l^. 



Reviews 



THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALL\ 

 By GREGORY M. MATHEWS, F.R.S.E. 

 Vol. X., pt. i., treats Scrub-Wrens and the Superb Warbler. 

 The high standard of this great work is well maintained, and the 

 beautiful hand-coloured plates by Gronvold are excellent. The 

 historical notes for which Mr. Mathews is justly famed are again 

 a striking feature. Five species form the genus Sericornis, the 

 sixth being the mysterious lost S. tyrannida, founded by De Vis, 

 for the "one example of this bird, and that of unknown sex." 

 An especially fine plate depicts two pairs of Superb Warblers 

 (Blue W^rens), one of the first known and best known of Aus- 

 tralian birds. Its name {cyaneus) is from Ellis's Narrative of 

 the Voyage of Captain Cook (1782), which recorded that, in 

 Tasmania, they met with "A small bird .... with a bright 

 blue head which we .... called Motacilla cyaiiea." 



THE SONGS OF THE BIRDS 

 P>y W. GARSTANG, M.A., D.Sc, Professor of Zoology in the 

 University of Leeds. 

 Throughout the civilised world much attention has been given 

 recently to the song of birds, which has proved to be a most 

 interesting and complicated business. It is difficult indeed to 

 understand clearly how the sound is produced, at all events in 

 detail, especially how the musculature of the .syrinx works. It 

 is still more difficult to be quite certain why the birds sing. More 

 recently observers who possess good musical ears or gramo- 

 phones have been copying the song of birds in musical nomen- 

 clature. As, however, many birds do not use the diatonic scale, 

 this has involved difficulty. The investigation has led to the dis- 

 covery that the range, while generally limited to an octave or 

 less, is greater sometimes — this circumstance may be related to- 

 the limited length of the cochlea of birds. 



