122 MATESHIP WITH BIRDS 



Our most familiar Robin of the woods is not, 

 however, one of the scarlet birds which grace the 

 fields of winter, but a relative with a breast of jon- 

 quil yellow. Probably almost every school-child in 

 southern New South Wales, Victoria, and South 

 Australia is on more or less intimate terms with the 

 Yellow-breasted Shrike-Robin colloquially the 

 "Yellow-Bob" or "Bark-Robin," scientifically Eop- 

 saltria Australia (Eos, dawn; psaltria, a harpist), 

 the Australian Psalmist of the Dawn. Among all 

 the bird-studies that have appeared in magazines 

 from time to time, probably no other species has 

 proved to be so favored of our steadily-growing 

 band of bird photographers. The inference is ob- 

 vious. Few among the smaller species of our 

 feathered Australians are so readily located, and 

 certainly no other is so "approachable," so well 

 adapted to photography at the nest. It has what 

 John Burroughs ascribed to a certain American 

 bird, "civil and neighborly ways," and that prac- 

 tically the whole year through. The Yellow-Bob is 

 no wanderer. It will remain faithful to one area 

 amid all the process of the seasons, and frequently 

 in spite of adversity. 



When the mellow days of Autumn have given 

 place to the severity of the southern Winter, when 

 the migratory birds have all gone north and the 

 nomads are wandering restlessly, the constancy of 

 our small friend of the yellow breast and grey back 

 makes his presence very gracious to the bush 

 rambler. Go where you will, an you show yourself 

 worthy the honor, the Yellow-Bob soon appears to 

 give greeting. Sit down quietly in some bush re- 



