^■«',.,^^'] Monthly Courcrsacionc. 11 



specimens in some Jam (Acacia) wood, near the Minilva River. 

 Honey-eaters, as one would naturally expect, are well repre- 

 sented, there being no less than 42 kinds, including Mc\xpha(fa car- 

 ieri, probably a distinctive species, not a sub-species of pcnicillata, 

 A pair of tine llower-Hirds ( Chlamydcra i/iiltata ) grace the collec- 

 tion. As far back as 1892, Mr. Carter procured the first re- 

 corded si)ecimen of this species for W.A.. and forwarded it lo 

 the National Museum, Melbourne, wiiere it arrived a Inuidk- of 

 dust and feathers. Fortunatelv in the same locality ( Xorth- 

 \\'cst region ) several more specimens of the same species were 

 collected which the finder and Mr. Mathews have called C. if. 

 p.orci. I See Ihis. 1920. p. 499, pi. 14.) 



The meeting, wliich included two English visit<)rs. Mr. and 

 Miss Wilson, was enthusiastic over Mr. H. L. White's last orni- 

 thological donation to the Nation, and closed with a vote of 

 thanks to the chairman. 



Reviews 



RECENT WORK BY MATHEWvS AND IREDALE. 



The indefatigable Mathew^s continues his remarkable output 

 of work of the first importance to Australian ornithfjJogists. The 

 parts of his great "Birds of Australia" have continued to arrive 

 with commendable regularity. The high quality of this important 

 work has been fully maintained. The first and second j^arts 

 of volume ix.. completing Mathews' treatment of the large and 

 difiicult group of Australian Flycatchers, are to hand. The 

 quality of the hand- coloured plates continues excellent. 



In conjunction with Tom Iredale, a re-grouping of the world's 

 birds is proposed in a valuable article on "Avian Taxonomy" 

 {Austral Avian Record, vol. iv., pts. 2 and 3). Some original 

 and daring changes are proposed. Plovers and Gulls are com- 

 bined into a large order. Frigate Birds ("now a small, separate 

 order) and Tropic-Birds (now a sub-order of the Gull-Plovei' 

 group) have been removed from the Pelican-Cormorant group 

 of Sharpe. 



Sharpe, in his Hand-list of the Birds of the IForld, used six 

 families for the Parrots. Mathews uses 16 families, but uses six 

 "super-families." 



As this new classification of Birds is stated by the authors 

 to be their "first attempt at providing a workable classification 

 of avine forms," the Check-list Committee did not depart from 

 Sharpe's Classification as used in "The Hand-list of the Birds of 

 the World," the Official Check-list, the last B.O.U. List, in 

 Alathews' various lists and his "Birds of Australia." 



Following this reclassification in the Austral Az-ian Record. 

 vol. iv., pts. 2-5, is a Name-List of the Birds of New Zealand. 



