THE SINGING HONEY-EATER. 239 



bird already described, except that the supplementary nest is not 

 present. 



A most beautiful pensile nest is made by the Singing Honey- 

 eater (Ptiloius sonorus), a species which is spread over a large 

 portion of Australasia. 



Here we have another example of an Australian singing-bird, 

 for the melody of this creature is so loud, so full, and so rich in 

 tone, that Mr. Gould compares it to that of the missel thrush. 

 It is a soberly-colored bird, though easily identified, the back be- 

 ing pale brown, the top of the head yellow, and a deep black 

 patch passing over the eye, and turning downward along the side 

 of the neck. It is a lively bird, as are all those feathered crea- 

 tures which feed chiefly on insects, and even in midwinter its 

 melodious song may be heard in full vigor. 



There is a very common tree in Australia, popularly called the 

 myall, known to scientific botanists as Acacia pendvla. The twigs 

 of this tree are long and very slender, and the leaves are so nar- 

 row and delicate that at a little distance they look more like 

 grass-blades than the leaf of a tree. The reader may remember 

 that this is a characteristic of all drooping or "weeping" trees, 

 the leaf and the twig being slender in proportion to each other. 

 The weeping birch and the weeping willow of our own country 

 are good examples of this peculiarity. 



Thus, as both the leaves and the twigs of the myall are extra- 

 ordinarily long and slender, the tree is chosen by many birds 

 which build pensile nests, as will be seen in the course of this 

 volume. It seems a tree that was made for the express purpose, 

 because the long and slender twigs serve the double purpose of 

 affording a firm attachment for the nest and suspending it where 

 no ordinary foe can reach it, while the delicate leaves give their 

 aid in fastening the nest to the twigs, and at the same time serve 

 to conceal the structure from prying eyes. 



Although the general structure of the nest is the same in all 

 parts of the country, the materials necessarily differ. In New 

 South Wales, the external shell of the nest is formed of very fine 

 dry stalks, not thicker than twine, while the lining is composed 

 of fibrous roots, matted together with spiders' webs. It is fasten- 

 ed by the rim to the twigs, and as a few of the slender twigs oc- 

 casionally are interwoven into the nest, it hangs quite securely. 

 In Western Australia the nest is made of grasses, which, although 



