^'"'iQ^i'^'] J-'^'^'i^^"^. Discovery oj /he [■ciiialc IkuJoks Scnth-liird. 261 



During October, iqiu, I captured the rare female in a hurriedly- 

 made and unsuitable net in the Dorrigo scrubs of New South 

 Wales, but she unfortunately escaped. For my full notes and 

 photos, re same, vide Emu, 191 1, vol. x., pp. 327-336. 



During my Macpherson Range hunt I first met with a male 

 Atrichornis on i8th September, 1919 ; he was calling loudly under 

 a great mass of debris of fallen trees and branches in a dense part 

 of the scrul) near a damp gully. On visiting the spot, after pa- 

 tiently wriggUng my way through a tantalizing tangle of vines, &c., 

 towards the sound, I was rewarded by getting a glimpse, for a 

 second, of the bird ; but he disappeared in an instant under a big 

 log, and did so with mouse-like actions. He then became silent, 

 although I waited fully an hour. It was 12 o'clock (noon) when the 

 male first called, and as usual no mate answered. At this juncture 

 of my investigations I still held the opinion, as mentioned by me 

 in my article published in the Emu quoted, that the female never 

 calls. A good hunt was made, but no sign of any nest could be 

 found, though many tufts of flat scrub-grass {Gahuia, sp.) were 

 most carefully examined. 



The three previous nests found by me in New South Wales 

 scrubs (the only ones known) were all in long grassy tufts in the 

 scrub close to large masses of debris of fallen trees, &c. The note 

 uttered by the male Atrichornis on this day (i8th September, 1919) 

 was rather like '' chit," short and shrill, varied from 5 to 12 

 "chits" uttered rapidly, getting louder towards the last calls. 

 Often a " chit " would be uttered, then a slight pause, and the 

 other 9 or 12 notes uttered in quick succession. But when only 5 

 (sometimes 4) notes were rendered, which is the ordinary call, there 

 was no pause after the first, and the notes were louder and more 

 drawn out, the last two notes being the loudest. When the male 

 utters his shrill "Chit-chit-chit-chit" notes of the ordinary call 

 described (4 to 5 calls), his tail shakes up and down most noticeably 

 as each note is rendered. I noted in 1898 and 1910 that the 

 ordinary call of this bird in the Dorrigo scrubs of New South Wales 

 is a prolonged and shrill note, resembling " Chirp-chirp-chirp- 

 chirp," usually repeated 4 times or more (generally 4) in succession, 

 with about half a second duration between each call, but some- 

 times the interval is a little longer, and the sound lowers in pitch 

 towards the last "chirps." Therefore the ordinary call of the Mac- 

 pherson Range bird differs from that of the birds of the Dorrigo 

 scrubs. \\'hen the 9 to 10 or 12 note " chit " call is rendered by 

 the Macpherson Range bird, the notes are often given so rapidly 

 that it is very difficult to count them, and it was some time before 

 I could satisfy myself of the number. 



At 3 p.m. the same day (i8th September) the male started to 

 call again under a mass of fallen timber debris. I got to the 

 place, and was so close to him that his shrill notes fairly rang and 

 vibrated in my ears ; yet I could not see him— he was all the time 

 moving about hidden under the heap of rubl)ish, and no doubt he 

 could see me. As was my experience witli this bird in the Dorrigo 



