On the Names of some Australian Birds. 53 



III. — Remarks on the Names of some Australian Birds. 

 By Alfred J. North, C.M.B.O.U., C.M.Z.S. 



Amongst the Australian Cuckoos the name Cuculus ffabelli- 

 formis of Latham appears to have been erroneously applied 

 by writers in general. This name (Ind. Orn. Suppl. ii. 

 p. xxx) was founded upon the " Fan-tailed Cuckow " of 

 the ' General Synopsis of Birds ' (Suppl. ii. p. 138). 

 Latham's description of the tail of the latter is as follows : — 

 " The tail is greatly cuneiform, the two middle feathers 

 black ; the others the same on the outer webs, but barred 

 on the inner with alternate black and white." Latham's 

 figure, too, on plate cxxvi. agrees with his description, 

 shewing that the outer webs of the outermost feather 

 on both sides — the only feathers with the outer webs 

 visible — are unbarred, and that the inner webs are only 

 toothed or notched about halfway across, and not barred 

 right across to the shaft. The description and figure, there- 

 fore, clearly do not apply to the Cacomantis Jiabelliformis of 

 the ' Catalogue of Birds in the British Museum ' (xix. p. 266) 

 aud of writers in general. A very good figure of the bird 

 to which Latham's name has been applied in the latter work 

 appears in Gould's folio edition of the l Birds of Australia' 

 (iv. pi. lxxxvi.) under Vigors and Horsfield's name of Cuculus 

 cineraceus, for which apparently the specific name of rufulus 

 of Vieillot will have to stand. I am unable, however, to 

 verify his reference. Gould's Cuculus insperatus is syno- 

 nymous with the true C. flabelliformis of Latham. In the 

 e Catalogue of Birds in the British Museum ' (xix. p. 273) 

 Captain Shelley, instead of placing Gould's name of Cuculus 

 insperatus as a synonym of Cacomantis variolosus, as he has 

 done with his C. dumetornm, allows it to stand for an 

 exclusively extra-Australian species which inhabits New 

 Guinea, New Britain, the Solomon and Am Islands, and 

 some of the Moluccas. The name cannot, however, be used 

 for a species inhabiting these islands, for it was founded 

 on an Australian specimen procured by Gould himself in the 

 Liverpool Range, New South Wales, on the 29th of October, 



