Notices on the migration ot birds in Australia. 583 



gularly for several years, then not again perhaps a 5 to 

 10 years. I have lately seen a list of »migra t o ryc birds 

 given in the Philosophical Society Papers of Bris- 

 bane Queensland in which the author Mr. Broadbent 

 gives the names of birds he found migrating to or from 

 Cape York, N. A., the whole is erroneous, the mistake 

 occurs by birds leaving the neighbourhood or district onlv; 

 if looked for they may be found dispersed or scattered 

 over the country singly or in pairs — otten only a few miles 

 distant. Towards the breeding season such species congre- 

 gate together and are found more easely by their voice (note) 

 which is readily heard at such times but seldom heard in 

 the wintermonths. Tanysiptera sylvia, is said to migrate 

 from New Guinea to Cape York, but the New Guinea 

 species, until recently supposed to be T. sjdvia, 

 is quite distinct and named by me T. salvadoriana. T. 

 Sylvia is very rarely if at all found in New Guinea — 

 T. galatea, found only a few miles on Islands in of Torres 

 straits, from Cape York — is never found at Cape York 

 itself — but is plentiful with T. salvadoriana on the S. 

 coast of New Guinea. Hereafter I hope to be able to 

 send you some notes for publication; at present the alter- 

 ations and additions to the Museum and my unfortunate ill 

 health has precluded me from many duties which have been 

 of late neglected partly through Indisposition, partly through 

 excess of work in this department. 



I have also received from His Excellency our Governor 

 of N. S. W. your letters and papers, I shall not delay in mak- 

 ing out registration forms for the Austr alian Colonies 

 and New Zealand. Our great draw back is the Identifi- 

 cation of our birds especially sea birds; very few birds of 

 any kind are attracted by the lighthouses' and lightships 

 or beacons — if we had migratory species of course 

 this would be different. — However I will not fail to report 

 to you from time to time such observations as I may deem 

 of interest. 



The Hirundinidae ; our species of Gallinago, Rliyn- 

 chaea, Merops, Artamus and some Ballidae, make the 



38* 



