164 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



It has been recently asserted, by no mean authority, in the 

 Ornis — a German periodical — that there are no migratory birds 

 in Australia, only nomadic or wandering, such as Lorikeets, &c. 

 Notwithstanding, I think it can be proved we have migratory 

 birds as well as nomadic, but their numbers, I have observed, 

 are regulated more or less by seasons. For instance, take the 

 the late great drought in Queensland and the interior. Last 

 season Unadorned or Pallid Cuckoos (Cacomantis pallida) 

 were exceedingly numerous in Victoria, and might have been 

 seen frequently perched on telegraph wires and on roofs in our 

 city, and I knew of nine Shining Flycatcher's fMyiagra nitida) 

 nests, with fresh eggs, having been observed in one day in 

 December within an area of less than half a mile square, at the 

 junction of two creeks, near Hobart, whither the birds had 

 migrated from Australia. Since, the drought has thoroughly 

 broken, with abundance of wet — in fact, causing devastating 

 floods in parts — and this season, although frequently out, I have 

 not noted a single Pallid Cuckoo, nor have the Flycatchers 

 visi:ed their old nursery grounds in Tasmania ; and, still more 

 remarkable, the Bronze Cuckoo ( Chalcites plagosusj, a regular 

 migrant from Australia to New Zealand in September, return- 

 ing again before winter, has been entirely absent this season 

 from some of its favoured localities in the latter country. 



We are aware that wet seasons produce myriads of insect life 

 (to wit, the locust and other plagues in our own colony), and no 

 doubt these insectivorous birds at such periods, by a proliiic 

 supply of food, are tempted to remain in more northern lati- 

 tudes, and consequently do not reach their ordinary southern 

 limit of migration ; while, on the other hand, by scarcity of food 

 during prolonged droughts, the birds are driven in considerable 

 numbers to their southern boundaries. 



Before passing from the migration question I should like to 

 state that, according to Dr. Seebohm, the Australian Curlew 

 ( Nwnenius cyanopusj breeds in south-eastern Siberia, from Lake 

 Baikal to the mouth of the River Amoor, passing along the coasts 

 of Japan and China on migrations, and crosses the Line to winter 

 in Australia. There have been several occurrences of the 

 Curlew in New Zealand, therefore it must sometimes travel over 

 a I oo" of the earth's surface, and if it be not a migrant, it certainly 

 is a nomad on a gigantic scale. 



302A. Glyciphila modesta — (Modest-coloured Honey- 

 eater). Locality — Cape York District, in North Australia, and 

 New Guinea. Egg — White, with here and there a few minute 

 specks of black ; length, gj lines ; breadth, 6^ lines. 



364. Ptilorhis Victori.^ — (Queen Victoria's Rifle-Bird-of- 

 Paradise). Locality — Rockingham Bay (Northern Queensland). 



