INSESSORES. 19 



genus yet discovered, and, independently of its smaller size, 

 it may be distinguished from its congeners by the more 

 swollen and gibbous form of its bill. Its native habitat is 

 New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia. I obtained 

 specimens on the Lower Namoi, more than three hundred 

 miles in the interior ; and the cedar-brushes of the Liverpool 

 range, Mr. Charles Throsby's park at Bong-bong, and the 

 sides of the creeks of the Upper Hunter, were also among the 

 places in which I killed it. So invariably did I find it among 

 the Camiarina, that those trees appear to be as essential to 

 its existence as the BanksitB are to that of some species of 

 Honey-eater ; the crops of those I killed were invariably 

 filled with the seeds of the trees in question. Its disposition 

 is less shy and distrusting than those of the Cali/ptorhyndd 

 banTcsii and fimereus, but little stratagem being required to 

 get within gunshot ; when one is killed or wounded, the rest 

 of the flock either fly around or perch on the neighbouring 

 trees, and every one may be procured. It has the feeble 

 whining call of the other members of the genus. Its flight 

 is laboured and heavy ; but when it is necessary for it to pass 

 to a distant part of the country, it mounts high in the air and 

 sustains a flight of many miles. 



It is not unusual to find individuals of this species with 

 yellow feathers on the cheeks and other parts of the head ; 

 this variation I am unable to account for; it is evidently 

 subject to no law, as it frequently happens that six or eight 

 may be seen together without one of them exhibiting this 

 mark, while on the contrary a like number may be encountered 

 with two or three of them thus distinguished. To this 

 circumstance, and to the variation in the colouring of the tail- 

 feathers of the two sexes, may be attributed the voluminous 

 list of synonyms pertaining to this species. 



There is no doubt that Mr. Caley was right in the opinion 

 expressed in his notes that this is the Carat of the natives ; 

 and he adds that it lays two eggs in the holes of the trees ; 



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