io8 
The Kmu. 
Eight skins, including five females and three males. 
The Bush-Larks are difficult to determine, because they have 
the same tendency to become more or less rufous* as with other 
desert forms, e.g., Anthus. In proportions they vary also. The 
above skins answer more closely to Dr. Sharpe's M. secunda than 
to any other, allowing an intensity of rufous to some and a pale 
tawny shade to others. The eyebrow varies to the same extent. 
That an allowance must be made for the varying intensity of the 
rufous colouring of the species is quite evident to me, as young 
and old of same dates bear a similar wash upon them. The 
general tendency is to become more deeply rufescent with age. 
This can be noted while comparing skins a, c, d, and e. With 
increasing age the blackish-brown centres on the chest feathers 
disappear, leaving a uniformly rufous-marked or pale tawny- 
white chest, as the bird may be of the rufous or pale-brown 
variety. Specimen with a white throat, has a paler mesial 
line above the eye than any others, which are clearly rufous. 
The tarsi in the following specimens are 0.9 inches in each 
case. 
a. Immature female, 24/7/00. Concluding its moult of the 
tail quills. 
b. Immature female, 24/7/00. The forehead and crown are 
blackish, with very narrow tawny edges to the feathers ; sides 
of face faintly rufous. This specimen, which appears to be an 
immature bird by comparison alone, answers to Dr. Sharpe's 
original description more than any other of my specimens. 
c. Adult male, 24/7/00. Forehead and crown rufescent, with 
blackish lines to the feathers ; sides of face much more rufous 
than in b. The whole of the bird distinctly marked with rufous. 
d. Adult female, 18/8/00. Slightly smaller than c. 
e. Adult female, 26/2/00. Rufous is upon every portion of 
this bird, the mandibles and outer tail quills included. 
g. Adult male, 24/6/00. 
In the above specimens the shoulder and wing coverts are 
more strongly rufous-marked than any other portions of the 
species. 
Subsequent to writing the above I have had the opportunity 
of examining the skins in the Australian Museum. Mr. North 
showed me specimens which I make connecting links between 
this species and M. zuoodwardz, Milligan — in parts deeply rufous. 
M. horsfieldi has been collected on the Fitzroy River — Calvert 
Exp. Rep., Roy. Soc. S. Aust., xxii., pt. ii., p. 141 (1898). 
Desert forms, I find, have a wide range of variation in colour 
from brown to deep uniform rufous. 
It appears to me that the birds in North- Western Australia 
are as a whole rufous, while the birds in the south-east of 
Australia are as a whole brown to greyish-brown. Connecting 
* "Darwinism " A. R. Wallace, p. 192 (1889). 
