82 Mr. G. M. Mathews on a recent 



This river is only about a hundred and fifty miles south of 

 Cape York, yet neither of these two birds lives there. They 

 are both conspicuous birds and appear to be common in the 

 locality, and the following note by Dr. Macgillivray (' Emu/ 

 xiii. 1914, p. 196), who personally visited the place, is 

 worthy of reproduction : — 



" It is usually dry, and the whole place shows the effects 

 of it, even the scrubs. Birds build their nests only to pull 

 them to pieces again or to desert them. We have taken 

 several nests of Eclectus, but cannot find that of Pseudo- 

 psittacus { = Geoffroyus). I have a Honey-eater, which is, I 

 think, entirely new. It is small and lives in the midst of 

 the scrubs. 



" The other day, for a moment or two, I saw a bird like a 

 Regent Bird, but it dived into the scrub and was gone. 



" It will take a generation of field-naturalists to find out 

 all the wealth of this district. There is another Parrot near 

 here, but we have not come across it yet — a black one. 



" Pseudopsittacus {=GeoJJ'roi/us) and Eclectus are calling 

 now — one from the opposite side of the creek, where there is 

 a nesting-tree, the other from a food-tree just below our 

 camp. . . . Existence here is very pleasant, and it is glorious 

 to walk in the morning and hear the multitudinous voices of 

 the birds. The chorus was a babel at first, but the species 

 are sorting themselves, and now our ears are becoming 

 educated to their calls/' 



When I arrived in Australia I examined the collection, 

 with Dr. Macgillivray, and I have named the Honey-eater 

 Macyillivrayornis clcmdi, and I also named a new Owl Tt/to 

 galei. I named a new subspecies of Finch, which added a 

 genus and species to the Australian list, viz. Erythrura 

 trichroa. 



As a result the first collection made about the Pascoe 

 and Claudie Rivers, contained five extraordinary birds, of 

 which three were representatives of extralimital genera, one 

 a new genus altogether, and the last quite a new species. 

 The fact that these birds were comparatively common and 

 also conspicuous entitles this discovery to rank as the most 

 important one of recent times in connection with Australian 



