62 PORT MOLLE 



depth of six feet, but the water had disappeared. 

 Port MoUe, besides being- a Avell sheltered harbour 

 from all prevailing- winds, has a much more pleasing 

 aspect than almost any place I have seen on the 

 north-east coast of AustraHa. To ourselves the 

 change was agreeable ; instead of the monotonous 

 gum-trees and mangroves of Port Curtis and the 

 scantily wooded stony hills of the Percy Isles, we 

 had here many varieties of woodland vegetation, 

 including some large patches of dense brush or 

 jungle, in which one might observe every shade of 

 green from the sombre hue of the pine, to the pale 

 green of the cabbage-palm. 



Some rare birds were procured in the brushes, — 

 two of them appear here to attain their southern 

 limits of distribution upon the north-east coast of 

 Austraha ; they are the Australian sun-bird 

 ( Cinnyris Australis), reminding one of the hum- 

 ming birds from its rich metallic colouring, and the 

 Megapodius Tumulus, a rasorial bird, the size of a 

 fowl, which constructs great mounds of earth, leaves, 

 sticks, stones, and coral, in which the eggs are 

 deposited at a depth of several feet from the surface, 

 and left there to be hatched by the heat of the 

 fermenting mass of vegetable matter. In addition 

 to these, our sportsmen were successftil in procuring 

 numbers of the pheasant-tailed pigeon, and the 

 brush-turkey (^Talegalla Lathami), the latter much 

 esteemed, from the goodness of its flesh. Many 

 plants and insects as well as several land-shells, new 



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