146 Stray Feathers. ["^isfocT 



parture in July, 1918. On one occasion I asked Messrs. W. D. 

 H. and A. S. Le Souef to come out and observe it, but, unfor- 

 tunately the day was windy and the birds were not visible. I 

 regularly saw and heard this bird about Double Day, Edgecliffe 

 and Darling Point, and have subsequently heard it at Rush- 

 cutters' Bay. Mr. A. S. Le v^ouef inl(jrmed me that it fre(|uented 

 the Sydney Botanic Gardens, and I have heard but not seen it 

 there. It has since been added to the collection at Taronga 

 Zoological Park. In habit the bird is verj' restless, constantly 

 moving or flying rapidly from place to place. At the same time 

 it was not very shy or timid, and disported itself on the shrubs 

 and trees close to the roadside, in full view ad the passers-by. 

 Building operations in an adjacent garden did not frighten it 

 away. The birds were often seen on telephone wires or on the 

 lops of tall trees, but also on the roses feeding on Aphides. They 

 frequently drank from and bathed in a large earthenware saucer 

 placed on my lawn for the use of birds. The jx^sture adopted 

 on perching is very erect. I mostly saw or heard this bird about 

 daybreak or from 9 to 10 a.m., or in the late afternoon. The 

 flight is rapid and straight, or somewhat undulating. The voice 

 is clear, ringing and musical or softer and lower, as if the bird 

 were chattering plaintively to itself. When uttered only a few- 

 yards away it often sounded far distant. Sometimes the direc- 

 tion of the sound could not be located, and the bird seemed to 

 possess "ventriloquial" powers. The loud notes might be roughly 

 likened to "Pretty creatures" or "Sweet creatures." I found no 

 nests. How many individuals there were I could not state. I 

 have seen two at the one time on a Robinia tree in our garden. 



(Dr.) ]o\iy MacPheksox, Sydney. 



Lyre-Birds and Lyra.— ^^'hen writing in The Emu (vol. xx., 

 p. 222 concerning Prince Edward's Lyre-Bird {Meinira 

 edwardi), I remarked that the first intimation of the ])resence 

 of a Mcnura in the granite belt of (Jueensland-Xew South \\ ales 

 came from a lad living at the small township of Lyra, and that 

 he had remarked that the i)lace received its name from the bird. 

 This was an erroneous assumption, but its a])i)earance in print 

 has served the useful purpose of discovering the real origin of 

 the name in question. The information came from Mr. R. 

 Hoggan, a veteran resident of Lyra, who stated that Lyre-Birds 

 are still to be found in the locality, but they had nothing to do 

 with the name of the town. The ]>lace, he says, was formerly 

 known as Accommodatiop Creek. This mouth-filling name did 

 not strike him as being fair to bushmen ; accordingly, early in 

 the nineties, he called on the then Commissioner of Railways 

 (Mr. Gray) to seek a change. Together they looked through 

 a small dictionary of aboriginal words, and discovered that the 

 native name for creek was "lira." "Well," .said Mr. Hoggan, 

 w^ith a .sense of poetic fitness, "why not spell it 'lyra'"" The 



