76 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



researches, and not all closet work, during the best breeding 

 months for the feathered tribes I have visited and dwelt in the 

 luxuriant tropical scrubs of North-eastern Australia, attractive for 

 the great variety of gorgeous birds, the great forests of the south- 

 east and Tasmania, and the forests of the beautiful-leafed 

 eucalypts and noble karri in the West. I have searched for 

 hidden secrets in the waterless tracts of the Mallee, the saltbush 

 plains, the pine ridges of the interior. The polygonum swamps 

 and reedy lagoons deterred, me not from wading in to investigate 

 strange stories of our water fowl, notwithstanding such places like- 

 wise breed innumerable leeches, mosquitos, snakes. Then, upon the 

 track of wild seabirds, I was allured on to many a rocky islet off 

 the coasts, often at mortal risk ; but the greater the risk the better 

 seemed the adventure. With genuine delight and with joyful 

 companions I spent some days and nights on islands girt about 

 with coral strands, under the pacific influence of the Great Barrier 

 Reef. On the mainland we could see the fires of the most 

 ferocious cannibals in Australia. With my own Club I joined in 

 the expeditions to the romantic islands in our Straits ; while alone 

 I proceeded to Western Australia, where for three days I was 

 tossed about on the Indian Ocean in a 15-ton lugger, in order to 

 reach these singular mushroom-shaped limestone rocks, Houtman's 

 Abrolhos. My cabin was the hold of the craft, my pillow was 

 my knapsack. The " skipper" apologized that he had only cold 

 mutton on board. I replied, " Thanks, I shall need nothing." 

 All thoughts of the terrible mal-de-mer were gone as I sprang 

 ashore, when I found not only a score of species, but thousands 

 upon thousands of birds engaged in the task of incubation or 

 hovering around. Day and night their voices unceasingly filled 

 the air. There were birds breeding upon the saltbushes, birds 

 breeding beneath the bushes, and birds breeding under the 

 ground below the bushes — literally tier upon tier. On an 

 adjacent island another remarkable sight greeted me. Countless 

 forms of dark-plumaged Noddies (the Lesser) were perched upon 

 mangroves. At intervals, without any apparent cause, these sea 

 birds would simultaneously rise and completely obscure the 

 horizon, so great were their numbers. Closer inspection proved 

 that the mangroves were loaded with their seaweed-built nests. 

 The birds occupying the lower levels had a very unenviable posi- 

 tion, and had a bedraggled and woe-begone appearance, from the 

 droppings of live guano from their brethren in the upper flats. 

 Such were some of the scenes by day. By night the locality 

 was filled with the moaning and human-like cries of nocturnal 

 Petrels, which, when accompanied by the howling wind and the 

 distant booming of the billows on the outer reef, was a weird 

 experience never to be effaced from my memory. 



Now, I have endeavoured to give a brief resume of the last 



