20 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



caught sight of me when too late to stop its career, and passed 

 under my bicycle and between my feet, and quickly disappeared 

 in the scrub : something had evidently disturbed it. As the 

 clearer country was reached near the Genoa River, two Grey 

 Kangaroos were passed close to the road. Although so early in 

 the season, a great deal of the country had been burnt by the 

 bush fires, and the blackened tree trunks gave the country a very 

 dismal appearance. In the country round about Mallacoota 

 nests and eggs were found of the following birds : — The Bronze- 

 wing Pigeon, Coachwhip Bird, Brush Wattle Bird, Superb Warbler, 

 Grey-backed Zosterops, New Holland Honey-eater, White- 

 throated Thickhead, Sordid Wood Swallow, Welcome Swallow, 

 White-shafted Fantail, Laughing Jackass, Brown Tree-creeper, 

 Blue Mountain Parrots, Spurwing Plover, Fire-tailed Finch, 

 Flame-breasted Robin, Emu Wren, and Spotted Ground Thrush. 

 Among other birds noted were the Funereal Cockatoo, Leach's 

 Cockatoo, Wonga Wonga Pigeon, King and Pennant's Parrots, 

 Satin Bower Birds ; and Chestnut-breasted Teal were very 

 numerous, and nesting. I saw none of the Slender or Grey Teal. 

 Musk Ducks were very plentiful in certain portions of the inlet, 

 and they were very local, probably because their food, which 

 was obtained by diving, was more plentiful there. A fisherman 

 once caught over one hundred of these birds here in one haul of 

 his net. There were a few Black-throated Grebes diving for their 

 food like the Musk Ducks. Lyre-birds were numerous in the 

 gullies, and their clear note often heard; and I heard one mocking 

 the whining of a puppy to perfection — it was by a deserted 

 miners' camp, and they used to leave the puppy fastened up 

 while they were away. The surveyors complain that these birds 

 fill up their trenches by scratchings, and pull off the pieces of paper 

 they place on their pegs when running a surveyor's line. I saw 

 a Harmonious Shrike Thrush catch a large grasshopper, and 

 flying up to a tree, impale the unfortunate insect on to a splinter 

 of wood, and then the bird began to devour it piecemeal, as it 

 was too large for one mouthful. The Black Snake is common 

 here in suitable localities, and on one occasion I unknowingly 

 walked between two of them, each about four feet six inches 

 long — they were about three feet away from me in the open, but 

 as I was looking up into a tree, had not noticed them ; after 

 watching them for a short time, the larger went down a neigh- 

 bouring rat-hole, and then the other disappeared under a heap of 

 dead scrub. They grow as long as six feet, and when that 

 size are formidable-looking customers to come across. Brown 

 Snakes are occasionally seen, and also Carpet and Diamond 

 Snakes — the latter is looked upon as a strictly New South Wales 

 snake, but it is found in Croajingolong, as far down the coast as 

 the Bemm River, sixty miles from Mallacoota, and perhaps 



