12 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



narrower staminoides ; the fruit, as yet unknown, may also be 

 different. The flowers are conspicuously larger than those of 

 B. obtusifolia, the only other Australian congener as yet dis- 

 covered, and some other differences occur between the two. 



Endiaxdra dichrophylla. 



Branchlets bearing a very thin silk-like vestiture ; leaves rather 

 large, ovate-lanceolar or almost ovate, short-acuminate, dark-green 

 on the surface, much paler on the lower page and there bearing a 

 very subtle-appressed indument, rather strongly keeled, their 

 primary venules thin and devoid at their axils of conspicuous 

 foveoles, the secondary venules reticular ; panicles usually much 

 shorter than the leaves, axillary and terminal, bearing a very thin 

 somewhat silk-like vestiture, bracts rather conspicuous, ovate- 

 lanceolar ; flowers very small, on extremely short pedicels ; 

 sepals somewhat larger than the petals, with these connate below 

 the middle and persistent; filaments extremely short; fruit narrow- 

 ellipsoid; pericarp very thin, outside black, glabrous; endopleura 

 of the seed brown. 



Russell's-River; Stephen Johnson. Height of tree, as far as 

 ascertained, to 40 feet. Leaves 2-5 inches long, \ l /i-2 broad, 

 their petioles rather short. Fruit when well developed about 1 

 inch long. The leaves resemble rather those of Cryptocarya 

 patentinervis, than those of any Australian Endiandra, although four 

 of the congeners have the leaves also greyish underneath, but the 

 costulation is less prominent and copious than in most of the 

 others, while besides various recorded characteristics separate 

 them. Several other new laurinaceous plants, of which we have 

 specimens in our collections from North-Queensland, can for 

 want of adequate material not yet be described. 



April, 1892. 



LYRE BIRDS. 



To the Editor 0/ the Victorian Naturalist. 



Sir, — It may be of interest to your readers and members of the 

 F.N.C. to learn that Lyre Birds are already beginning to build in 

 the Uandenong Forest. On 23rd March Mr. Robert C. Chandler 

 and I found a newly started nest there, the walls of which were 

 raised by the birds at least two inches between the time of our 

 passing in the forenoon and return some three hours later. This 

 early building has been suggested as an explanation of the fact of 

 two eggs being occasionally found in one nest. The bird laying 

 now is supposed to get tired of sitting, to desert the nest, and to 

 return at the usual breeding season (from June forward), when she 

 lays another egg, and sits again. What say our ornithologists ? — 

 Yours, &c, 



H. KENDALL. 



Rath mines Grove, Auburn. 



