THE EMU. 149 



being covered with a little cape of long feathers of the 

 most splendid bright ultra-marine colour. The blue wren 

 is common at all seasons throughout the whole bush, 

 frequenting small scrub and old honeysuckles, and is very 

 partial to tea-tree scrub by the side of creeks. The male 

 has a pretty little song, which he trills out when perched 

 upon an old dead log, with his family round him, for we 

 rarely saw a blue bird without four or five brown-co- 

 loured birds in his company. The females and young 

 birds of the year are plain dull-brown, with a light-blue 

 tail, and some have a reddish throat. I do not think the 

 male birds come to their full plumage till after two or 

 three moults, and, like all the other handsome birds 

 here, they are in best and hardest feather in the winter. 

 The little Emu or Pheasant Wren was the smallest 

 bird in our parts, scarcely larger in the body than a great 

 bumble-bee. The whole colour is light-brown, the fea- 

 thers loose and long, and the male has a pale-blue throat. 

 The tail is about three times as long as the body, com- 

 posed of six feathers (the middle ones much the longest) 

 all clothed with fibres, after the manner of the tail-feathers 

 of the native pheasant. It has very small wings, and 

 weak powers of flight, in fact, when flying it appears to 

 have a difficulty in bearing its long tail. It is a busy 

 little bird, and I liked much to watch a family of them 

 creeping about the small scrub and heather like so many 

 little field-mice. "We generally found them in small 

 colonies or families, among heather, low scrub, or long 

 grass on the plains and swamps : they were very hard to 



