276 Jackson, In the Barron River Valley, N.Q. [isfjune 



upon a suspended vine, and by a rapid succession of " hops " 

 arrive at tjie top of the tree. Fearful storm to-day, which 

 interfered with my photographic work and played havoc with 

 our camp. 



To-day (13th December) I photographed the neat play- 

 ground (one of the few now occupied) behind our camp (vide 

 Plate XXIII.), the property of the male bird of nest No. i, robbed 

 on the 8th December. While busy fixing my camera the male 

 Tooth-bill suddenly became brave, and flew into the vines above 

 my head with a snail-shell {Helix macgillivrayi) in his bill. Then 

 he was off in a flash. Again he returned, uttering a scolding 

 cry, such as he and the female had made when I was removing 

 the eggs from her nest. In the play-ground I found a stone 

 surrounded with many freshly broken shells of scrub-snails, the 

 bodies of which these birds evidently sometimes feed upon. 

 Perhaps Mr. Tooth-bill wished me to quit the spot in order that 

 he might get at his little stone-anvil. x\fter the photograph had 

 been taken I visited the bower belonging to the female bird, 

 which was not far away, but it was full of dead leaves and 

 neglected, so I left it. Found a new nest of the Victoria Rifle- 

 Bird being built. The darkie stated that " Leep only sit down 

 yet," meaning it had only just been started, and contained 

 simply leaves. Another severe and destructive storm was 

 experienced. 



14th December. — The scrub is now exceedingly close and 

 humid after the heavy rains, and is full of fever. Everything in 

 the camp — food, clothes, tent, &c. — gets covered, in one night, 

 with green mould {P enicillium). 



In the upright roots of the huge parasitical fig-tree at the rear 

 of the camp — a forest giant measuring 60 feet through a 

 few feet from the ground — we flushed several Sooty Owls [Strzx 

 ienedrz'cosa), and found what we took to be their old nests. I had 

 already photographed this tree, and the illustration which is given 

 here shows a much smaller one of the kind, which, being 

 situated away from the scrub on cleared ground, made a better 

 subject for the camera. When going through the scrub this 

 morning, at a part which one of our most recently located pairs of 

 Tooth-bills frequented, I noticed one of the birds fly up on to the 

 limb of a tree situated about 30 yards to our left. On sighting 

 her I signalled to Mr. Frizelle to sit down and watch her. It 

 was very warm, and the bird sat for a long while motionless on 

 the limb with her bill open. The manner in which the bird 

 arrived and departed led me to believe that she had really come 

 from a nest. So a little later Mr. Frizelle and I walked slowly 

 and cautiously over to the trees from which she appeared to 

 have flown, and eventually we struck a likely one only 40 

 yards to the rear of our camp. It was a bean or scrub chestnut- 

 tree, and thickly overgrown with a large-leaved creeping plant. 



