310 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



shorter, broader, and straighter than in the opposite sex, and 

 broadly webbed on both sides of the shaft. 



Since the above appeared in the foHo edition, I have been 

 favoured with several notes respecting this species which, in 

 justice to the writers, I here insert. 



The first is from A. A. Leycester, Esq., who says — 

 " These birds hitherto have been found only on the Rich- 

 mond and Tweed rivers, in the dense brushes which clothe 

 the mountains in those districts ; and, what is most remarkable, 

 though similar mountains and brushes exist on the rivers both 

 north and south of those rivers, yet the M. alherti is never to 

 be found in them, their boundary appearing to be limited to 

 a patch of country not wider than eighty by sixty miles. 



" The habits of Menura alherti are very similar to M, su- 



perha. Having seen and watched both on their play-grounds, 



I find the M. alherti is far superior in its powers of mocking 



and imitating the cries and songs of others of the feathered race 



to the M. snjperha ; its own peculiar cry or song is also different, 



being of a much louder and fuller tone. I once listened to 



one of these birds that had taken up its quarters within two 



hundred yards of a sawyer's hut, and he had made himself 



perfect with all the noises of the sawyer's homestead — the 



crowing of the cocks, the cackling of the hens, and the 



barking and howling of the dogs, and even the painful 



screeching of the sharping or filing of the saw. I have 



never seen more than a pair together. Each bird appears 



to have its own walk or boundary, and never to infringe on 



the other's ground ; for I have heard them day after day in 



the same place, and seldom nearer than a quarter of a mile 



to each other. Whilst singing, they spread their tails over 



their heads like a Peacock, and droop their wings to the 



ground, and at the same time scratch and peck up the earth. 



They sing mornings and evenings, and more so in winter 



than at any other time. The young cocks do not sing until 



they get their full tails, which, I fancy, is not until the fourth 



