226 
Tlic Birds of Tasmania. 
'■ Most attractive of all to the stranger are the birds of the Parrot- 
" tribe: in the forests on i\It. Wellington two kinds are met with, one of 
" which, the Yellow-bellied Parrakeet (Platyccrciis fjavhentris), a fine 
■' green and yellow bird with blue wings and a very long tail, which feeds 
" almost entirely on seeds, and when started emits a curious cry, Cussek, 
" cussek, in rapid succession. It builds its nest in the holes of Gum-trees." 
" The other much rarer species met with on the mountain is the 
'' lUack Cockatoo (Calyptorhyiichus xanthonotus), a very large jet-black 
" bird with saffron-coloured ears, and some brilliant saffron feathers in its 
" tail. This is one of the handsomest Cockatoos, but is practically never 
" seen in captivity owing to the extreme difficulty of getting the young 
■' from the nest, and the old l)irds are far too wild to catch or to tame. 
'■ Indeed, until recently a nest had never been found, but in felling a 
'' gigantic gum spar a nest was discovered in a hollow near the top. This 
" Cockatoo feeds on grubs which it extracts from under the bark of Gum- 
" trees and from rotten timber; it is a powerful flier and rarely lets one 
" approach within gunshot the only other time I was 
" within gunshot range of the bird was when I was driving to Lake St. 
" Clair: my gun and ammunition were packed at the bottom of the buggv, 
■" when suddenly in a clearing I came upon five beautiful Cockatoos sitting 
" quite fearlessly on the lower branches of some small Gum-trees and 
'■ preening their feathers in the sunlighr.'" 
As I have written 1 have found the various extracts 
rtinuing into such lengthy copy, that I have refrained from 
interpolating notes of the ahove birds in aviaries; instead I 
must refer my readers to back volumes of Bird Notes. 
I must state here that the book is divided into four parts 
or sections, viz : Hobart oiid the Midlands; The Lake District; 
The North and IVcst Coast; and Cliinpscs into the. Past. 
The principal bird notes are given in the first part, and 
are quoted above, but they lose much, owing to space conditions 
compelling me to leave out most of the vivid descriptions of 
the forests and the tree and plant life they contained. The 
book is an intensely interesting one. as the entire fauna of 
Tasmania is descriptively dealt with, though not in catalogue 
form, nor yet with any attempt to describe every species. The 
word pictures and photo-reproductions of tropical vegetation, 
highlands and lowlands, enable one to envisage the wild creat- 
ures and their characteristics very realistically — features not 
entirely lost within the confines of large aviaries — and then to 
realise the ease and freedom with which they adapt themselves 
to captivity or restrained liberty. To some extent their pro- 
