I ^20. J tVestern Australian Birds. (585 



finding room for niy outfit. The sheep started away early 

 every niorning, ;ind tlie waggon followed them, some- 

 times on a Imsh " road," but mostly across o})en country. 

 Mr. McLeod liad his motor car with him, but most of the 

 time it was fastened by ropes to the hind axle of the waggon, 

 and I travelled in it, trying to keep it straight behind the 

 waggon. There was often much Spinifex in large tussocks, 

 occasional rocks, and sometimes thick scrub up to twelve 

 feet in height, but wherever the waggon went, the motor car 

 had to follow. Sometimes we would suddenly come to the 

 edge of a steep declivity, and the camels had a cheerful way 

 of going down it at a clumsy gallop, with the motor bounding 

 after it in a most exhilarating way, over all and sundry 

 obstacles, none of wdiich I could see ahead of me on account 

 of the waggon. However, I never quite capsized the motor, 

 and we reached the Minilya on 30 August. I did twelve days' 

 field-work there, and left on 12 September by mail coach 

 drawn by five camels for Carnarvon. When forty miles 

 south of the Minilya, I " stopped off " five days at a station 

 owned by Mr. Harry (Jampbell, another old friend of mine, 

 as when passing through his country by mail coach on 

 previous excursions I had seen some undoubted Climacteris 

 in some or the "Jam'' (^Acacia acuminata) timber that grew 

 there, and thought the}' must be Climacteris wellsi, first 

 obtained by Mr. Shortridge on the U[)per Gascoyne River in 

 1908 (see 'Ibis' 1909, p. G50), when the breeding-habits 

 were not known. My surmise proved correct, and I found the 

 birds breeding, as described later in this paper. Mr. Camp- 

 bell kindly motored me to (Carnarvon on 18 September, and 

 as the Gascoyne River had ceased flow-ing, the friendly aid 

 of a camel, hooked on in front of the motor car, enabled us 

 to cross the heavy sandy bed, about a mile in width, which is 

 always very difficult for a motor to do unaided. I sailed 

 from Carnarvon to Dirk Hartog Island on 27 September. 



The trip from which I have recently returned was made 

 in order to effect the sale of my station at Broome Hill. I left 

 Liverpool 30 October, 1918, travelling by ss. 'Carmania' 

 to New York ; thence by railway to Montreal, Banff, and 



