THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 55 



end of August and in the early part of September, 1896. At that 

 time flood waters had caused the Yarra to run nearly bank high, 

 and in doing so the small flat at the junction of Gardiner's Creek 

 with the Yarra was under water. Each evening, for four or five days, 

 about five o'clock, a batch of Cormorants (Little Black) would 

 arrive from a south-westerly direction and circle round above this 

 flat. Soon they would be joined by a second and a third batch, 

 until quite three or four hundred had collected, and as night fell 

 they would all roost nithe trees that were standing in water. After 

 the Yarra subsided nothing more was seen of the Cormorants. 



A bird not included in my list, but nevertheless might be so, is 

 the Australian Bee-eater, Merops ornatus. While passing through 

 Toorak one evening in summer (14/12/96) on my way homewards 

 from the Horticultural School, I observed a solitary specimen. 

 How the bird came to be so far out of its usual habitat I cannot 

 explain. 



NOTES. 



Early Nesting. — It may be interesting to record that on 

 Easter Monday last, 3rd April, I flushed a crow, Corvus coronoides, 

 from her nest, upon which she was sitting very close and seemed 

 reluctant to leave. On 15th April, at Melton, a nest of Ephthian- 

 ura albifrons was observed, with a full clutch of three eggs, 

 while many others were in course of construction. — T. A. Brittle- 

 bank. Myrniong, i8th April. 



Description of the Eggs of the Russet-tailed Ground- 

 Thrush, Geocichla heinii, Cabanis. — In my MSS. (now in 

 London) I have described an egg of a Ground-Thrush, from South 

 Queensland, in the collection of Mr. Dudley Le Souef, which I 

 believe is referable to the abovenamed species. I have since 

 received similar eggs from the Richmond River district (N.S.W.), 

 which are smaller, less marked, and greener in the ground-colour 

 than those of either of the southern birds, G. lunulata and G. 

 macrorhyncha. Dimensions in inches of a pair — (i) 1.19 x .82 ; 

 (2) 1. 18 X .85. Two eggs are usually a clutch. Breeding 

 months, as far as is yet known, are from September to January. — 

 A. J. Campbell. Armadale, 20th May, 1899. 



The Little Eagle, Niscetus (Aquila) morphnoides. — During 

 a residence of upwards of 30 years in this district (Somerville), 

 25 at least of which I have been a very close observer of both the 

 residental and also the migratory species of birds, I have never 

 previously met with the Little Eagle. The specimen exhibited 

 to-night was shot within half a mile of the railway station, where 

 it had been for some two or three weeks making occasional raids 

 upon some poultry the property of a resident, who having de- 

 scribed the bird to me previous to shooting it, I had imagined to 



