U' CUClLILl.K 



forehead, cron-n nftlie head ami mantle 'lull leadeii-i/rey, liei-mainii xliijlitl i/ liijlder mt /he sides nf tlie 

 head (Hid neck : ear-c<>rerts and the throat, fore-neek aiid hreast liyht leadeii-ijrey, slromjly irnshed, 

 irith rufoii't on tin' apirnl jiortiioi nf tin- fen/In fs, nud jinssimj into rnfonsdmji On the reiaaiwlernfthe 

 wilder surfaee and under toil cn-i ris , nnder /riin/cnrerts rnfons-linjl': liill hinej,- : leys n nd feej jleshy- 

 hron-ti, darker in front: eylnl iiearfyreii, iris dark lironni. Total leni/th in the jhsh .9'^ inches, 

 H'iiiy 'f2, tail 4il, bill (ftl..', tarsus OH. 



Adult female. — Similar in jilnniaye to fin male. 



Distrihulion — Xortli-western Australia, N(jrthern Tenitoiy of South Australia, (.)ueensland, 

 New South Wales, Victoria. 



^^HE Brush or Square-tailed Cuckoo may easily be distinf^uished from the preceding species 

 by its smaller size, li.ghter fore-neck and breast, and by ha\in,c; the lateral tail feathers 

 notched or toothed witli white only on their inner webs. It is widely distributed over the 

 Australian contment; the type was described by Messrs. \'if,'ors and 1 lorstield in the " Trans- 

 actions of the Linnean Society of London," from the skin of a young bird obtained by Caley in 

 the neighbourhood of Parramatta, New South Wales, and the above description is taken from 

 an adult male procured in the same locality. 



In the "Catalogue of ISirds in the British Museum," Captain G. E. Shelley includes 

 Cuculus diinuiorum, Gould, from the noi th-western coast of Australia, as a synonym of the 

 species, a decision with which probably no one will disagree, for I have specimens now before 

 me obtained by the late Mr. T. 11. bSowyer- Bower, near I)erby, North-western Australia, and 

 they are indistinguishable in size and colour from others procured near Sydney. Gould 

 apparently erred in separating the north-western bird from his Cacvmantis impevatus ; the 

 figures of the latter, in his folio edition of the " Birds of Australia," he states are of the natural 

 size, and the wing measurement thus represented is 5-1 inches. In his "Handbook of the 

 Birds of Australia," he erroneously gi\es the wing measurement of C. tuspcvatns as 6^ inches, 

 and that of C. dninctonnu as 5 inches, whereas between the wing measurement of his figure and 

 his C. ditmctenim there is in reality only a difference of a tenth of an inch, instead of one and a 

 half inch, as represented by Gould. As pointed out by me in "The Ibis,"' Gould's Cuculus 

 inspcratus agrees with Latham's original description and figure of C. flahclliforiids, but it has since 

 been discovered that the latter name was founded only on W'atling's paintings, and it would 

 be better to allow the name to stand than to change the nomenclature again. In the 

 " Catalogue of iiirds in the British Museum," Captain Shelley, instead of placing Gould's name 

 of Cuculus iuspcrutus as a synonym of Cuconuinlis variolnsus, as he has done with his C. diniiclciinn. 

 allows it to stand for an exclusively extra Australian species which inhabits New ISritain, New 

 Guinea, the Solomon and Aru Islands, and some of the Moluccas. Dr. K. B. Sharpe has also 

 copied this error in his " Hand-list of Birds." I The name cannot, however, be used for a 

 species inhabiting these islands, for it was founded on an Australian specimen procured by 

 Gould himself, in the cedar brushes of the Liverpool Range, New South Wales, on the 2gth of 

 October, 1839, and must rank as a synonym of Ou-duiantis variolosus. 



There are also specimens in the Australian Museum Collection, procured in the Northern 

 Territory of South Australia, in dillerent parts C'f ( )ueensland, from Cairns on the north-east to 

 the Coomura River in the south-eastern part of that State. In New South Wales, from various 

 localities in the neighbourhood of Sydney ; also from the Clarence, Richmond and Tweed 

 Rivers on the northern coastal districts. I have also examined specimens obtained at Heidelburg 

 and the Dandenong Ranges, Victoria. 



The wing measurement of adult males varies from 4*9 to 5-2 inches. 



* Ibis, 1906, p. 54. t H-l. P.ds , Vol. I]., p. iCio (1900). 



