682 Mr. T. Carter on some [Ibis, 



I thonght it would be a good opportunity to make a third 

 attempt to obtain breeding notes of Stipiturus malaclivrns 

 rnficeps and Eremiornis in the vicinity of the North-West 

 Capo as soon as the Australian summer was well over. 

 Meanwhile I revisited Lake Muir — a fine sheet of brackish 

 water about twelve miles by six in the extreme south-west, 

 and was there a fortnight, and then worked through that 

 area, staying a few days at localities on the Upper and 

 Lower Blackwood River, and also on the Margaret, Vasse, 

 and Collie rivers. Several days were also spent in the 

 vicinity of Cape Menielle, near where I had seen Spliemira 

 longirostris and Psoplwdes nujrogular'is in 1903; but most of 

 the coastal country had been burnt bare of the former dense 

 scrub, in order to ''improve" it for cattle-grazing, and 

 apparently the above interesting birds have been exterminated 

 from that locality. Some of the large lakes and swamps 

 where many water-fowl abound, within a twenty-mile radius 

 of Perth, were also visited ; and on 19 April I sailed for 

 Shark Bay and Dirk Hartog Island (for accounts of which 

 see 'Ibis,' October 1917), leaving there on 27 May by 

 steamer for Carnarvon, where I stayed three weeks. I had 

 the pleasure of seeing the great Gascoyne River come down 

 in full flood, filling the dry sandy bed (about three-quarters of 

 a mile wide) with from twelve to twenty feet depth of water, 

 from bank to bank, in a few hours^ time. On 17 June 

 I sailed in a schooner for Maud's Landing, arriving on the 

 19th, expecting to be able to travel to Point Cloates with the 

 fortnightly mailman ; but he arrived several days late with 

 only a pack-horse, as the three rivers between there and 

 Carnarvon — viz., the Lyndon, Minilya, and Gascoyne — were 

 all running bankers and impassable for vehicles. It seemed 

 as if I should again be disappointed in reaching the North- 

 West Cape, but after a few days, by great good fortune, a 

 carpenter turned up to effect some repairs on the jetty, and 

 I was able to hire his strong and " roon^y " buckboard buggy, 

 with pair of horses and full camping outfit, for a term of 

 two months; so I lost no time in proceeding to Point Cloates, 

 and called on the lighthouse keeper, Mr. Stuart, who was an 



