I A A Australasian Ornithologists' Union. (niiTui 



tinent, which comes within the scope of our labours, we can still 

 afford to extend our operations to important adjacent sub-regions 

 which have affinity in their avifauna with Australia; for by so 

 doing we are certainly contributing, through the pages of The 

 Emu, towards the general knowledge of the ornithology of what 

 are most interesting provinces at our very doors, and which are 

 so distant from Europe that their exploration from there is a 

 matter of great difficulty and expense. In this connection, our 

 secretary, with the assistance, perhaps, of some of our Queensland 

 members, might be able to enlist correspondents both in Java and 

 southern New Guinea. 



Alluding again to the Australian " Region," which is the home- 

 sphere of our work, the vastness of the field open to our investi- 

 gations in it can be best appreciated when we consider that 

 the area is nearly equal to that of Europe, to which the labours 

 of the ornithologists of the United Kingdom, France, Germany, 

 and all the countries of Europe are largely devoted. In other 

 words, the territory for investigation, nearly equal to that 

 offered to the combined naturalists of Europe, is open to our 

 members, and with what splendid possibilities as regards a vast 

 increase to ornithological discovery. And in this connection 

 we find that already the pages of The Emu have, in no small 

 degree, added to our information concerning the ornithology 

 of the North-West and Northern " sub-regions " of Australia, 

 as foreshadowed in my inaugural address, and alluded to again 

 in last year's. These have been, until recently, almost unexplored 

 fields, and being the habitat of rare representatives of Southern 

 forms, the point of arrival on our shores of many Limicoline 

 birds, the passing ground of Asiatic and Malayan visitants to 

 Australia, and the winter abode of some Australian internal 

 migrants, they are the most interesting ornithological provinces 

 of our region. Much acquisition to our knowledge has accrued 

 from the papers on collections and eggs by Messrs. Hall and 

 Le Souef, on the habits and distribution of birds in the North- 

 West by Mr. Carter, and the notes on and lists of migrants by 

 Messrs. Cochrane and Berney, from Northern Queensland. The 

 early dates of breeding — that is, in the midwinter of the South, 

 June and July — of not a few widely distributed species I will 

 hope to touch upon presently. 



It will now be opportune, perhaps, to pass under review the 

 good work done in The Emu since the last meeting in Melbourne, 

 November, 1902. 



As the result of the pleasant outing at the Ornithologists' 

 Camp at Phillip Island, an interesting account was written, by 

 the editors, of the "Mutton-Bird" rookery* in which some note- 

 worthy details of the habits of the birds were given and a beautiful 

 photograph of the Little Penguin (Eudy ptula minor') on its nest 



* It would be well to do away with this inappropriate name, and substitute 

 " colony" or "petrelry." 



