Vol. IX. 

 1909. 



1 Fletcher, Bird Notes from Cleveland, Tasmania. 83 



half fledged. The little creatures hid under the thyme bushes, 

 nth December. — About a couple of chains from above spot I 

 disturbed a Painted Quail with four young ones. In the short 

 glimpse I obtained as they ran to the reeds I noticed they 

 appeared to be clothed in down intermingled with feathers. 

 They had all been lying in a sand-bath when I suddenly dis- 

 turbed them. A few days afterwards, on 20th December, I 

 passed through the same patch of reeds. It was about 7 o'clock 

 in the evening, and as I was walking quickly along a male 

 Painted Quail whirred in front of me. Looking down, I saw 

 where it had been dusting; so I thought— "Sitting bird, dusting so 

 late in the day," and set to work to hunt for the nest, but for 

 some time without success. As light was fading, I was just 

 giving up the search for that day when I discovered another 

 dusting hollow and much excreta. This at once told me it was 

 a sitting bird I had flushed, so, searching longer, I discovered 

 four eggs in a little depression under a banksia sapling about 2 

 feet high. The nest was sheltered by the reeds and banksia and 

 lined with half a dozen grass-stalks. The eggs were lying with 

 their points towards the centre. In Mr. Seth-Smith's paper he 

 tells how the female leaves the incubation of the eggs to the 

 charge of the male bird and seeks a fresh mate. The above 

 facts from nature appear to corroborate the conduct of the 

 Turnix varia in captivity. 



Variation in TrichogIossus» Vig. and Hors. 



By Robert Hall, C.M.Z.S., Col. M. B.O.U. 



Some time ago I purchased in one parcel 60 skins of what 

 appeared to be T. scptetitrionalis, sub-sp., Robinson. They were 

 labelled " Southern Queensland." Robinson says*: — " The 

 northern representative of this common Australian Lory can 

 readily be distinguished by the smaller size and by the brighter 

 and purer blue of the head and abdominal patch. Some of the 

 specimens from Mounts Sapphire and Bellenden-Ker agree very 

 fairly with the original specimens from Cooktown, whilst others 

 approach the typical form more nearly, so far as colouration is 

 concerned, but all are distinctly smaller in dimensions." 



Salvadori, writing of the species, T. novcE-JioUaiidice, Gm., 

 , says'!" : — " Breast yellow, more or less stained with red along 

 the middle, sometimes almost entirely red except on the sides." 

 My skins show — 



a. The young (six specimens) exhibit a nearly uniform 

 yellow breast, with a small proportion of red upon 

 the central area. 



* Ibis, October, 1900, p. 642. 



t Cat. Jiirds Brit. Mus., xx., p. 59 (1891). 



