292 Zoological Society: — 



whole continent of Australia, as well as New Zealand. In the latter 

 country I have myself met with it at every port I visited, from 

 Stewart's Island to Auckland, where it arrives about September, and 

 leaves during February and March. 



(2.) The Unadorned Cuckoo (Cucidus inornatus) : Gould, B. 

 Austr. iv. pi. 85. 



When the eggs of two or more species of Cuckoo are found in the 

 same locality, and the birds themselves equally plentiful during the 

 same months, it becomes difficult to determine which is the egg of 

 each species, except perhaps where there is a great difference in the 

 size of the birds. Even this, however, must not be depended upon 

 in too great a degree, as will be seen in the present case. Following 

 the same plan as in the case of the Bronze Cuckoo (Chalcites lucidus), 

 we succeeded in procuring two young Cuckoos from eggs which we 

 had left in the nests of the Yellow-whiskered Honey-eater (Ptilotis 

 auricomis). These, when fledged, we at once recognized to be the 

 young of Cuculus inornatus. 



The young, upon leaving the nest, have the throat, face, and 

 shoulders black ; the rest of the upper and under surface and tail 

 irregularly marked with dashes and stripes of black, scarcely two fea- 

 thers, even of wings, being alike. They retain this plumage until 

 March and April, during which months all the specimens I procured 

 were commencing to assume the more dusky plumage of the adult. 

 During these months all the old birds seem to have left us, the young 

 of the last season alone being found. 



The present species arrives early in September, and is usually met 

 with in pairs, showing a preference for the half-cleared land and belts 

 of trees skirting the more cultivated parts. They may frequently be 

 seen perched upon the dead tops of trees, or among the lower open 

 branches, or often on the posts and fences, from which they pounce 

 down upon any unhappy grasshopper or cricket that they may have 

 discovered lurking in the grass. 



Their food consists chiefly of Gryllidcc and Phasmidce, various 

 species of Mantis, and often the beautiful larvse of the Ccequosa 

 triangularis and Anthercea eucalypti, which they obtain among the 

 leafy tops of the Eucalyptus trees. The crops in some specimens, 

 procured in October last, contained nothing but grasshoppers, which 

 appear to be their favourite food. 



In this neighbourhood they usually deposit their eggs in the nests 

 of Ptilotis auricomis, but also occasionally in those of Ptilotis chry- 

 snps, but rarely in those of Ptilotis fusca and Melithreptus lunu- 

 latus ; in other districts, doubtless, in any nests suitable for the pur- 

 pose. I have frequently observed that whenever the eggs of Cuckoos 

 have been deposited in open nests, there is manifested a decided pre- 

 ference for those of birds which lay eggs similar to their own. 



The Cuckoo's eggs mentioned in my notes upon the Yellow- 

 whiskered Honey-eater (P. auricomis) in the 'Ibis' (vol. vi. 1864, 

 p. 245) as being found in the nest of that bird, I have now no 

 doubt belong to Cuculus inornatus, and not, as I then supposed from 

 their small size, to Cuculus cincraceus. 



