126 Mr. R. Hall on Birds 
a large salt-bush was easily hidden by the structure for 
which it formed a basis. Many of the nests were not more 
than three feet high^ but others were much larger, and all were 
upon the ground. Mr. Gilbert spoke of a wonderful struc- 
ture upon Rotnest Island being fifteen feet in circumference. 
One of those I found measured at the base twenty feet 
six inches, the top being ouly two feet from the ground, 
and being forty inches across, with a depression for the 
young of three inches. Living Salsolaceae were growing 
upon three sides. Another nest upon an islet south-east of 
East Wallabi Island of the Abrolhos may be described as 
five feet six inches high, seven feet at the base, three feet 
six inches across the top, with a depression of about four 
inches ; it was cone-shaped with the apex sliced off, and was 
composed of salt-bush branches regularly heaped up, having 
dead pieces of coral and sponges interspersed. The nest had 
salt-bush growing up oue side. Within it were marine weeds, 
sponges, and a few pieces of green plants. The whole 
structure was practically a small stack of wood cylindrically 
placed on end in the middle of a few acres of dead coral, 
of which the island is almost entirely composed. 
The Osprey is referred to by Professor Newton "^ as a 
daring bird, and oue that, if possible, severely handles the 
collector of its eggs or young. On that part of our coast 
washed by the Indian Ocean the birds do not appear to 
attack an intruder, and all that attracted my attention 
when handling the young was their plaintive cry high above 
the nest. 
3. Strepera plumbea. Leaden Crow-Shrike. (Hall's 
Key, p. 8.) 
Sk. ad. ^. 3.10.99. Denmark River. 
The only specimen secured helps to support the view that 
/S. plumbea is a subspecies of S. cuneicaudata. For two 
hundred miles northward this bird is commonly known as 
** the squeaker.'^ Young were in the nest on October 25th. 
* ' Dictionary of Birds,' p. 661 (1896). 
