98 
RECORDS OF TIIE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM. 
was found to be as clean as when placed in the case fifteen months 
previously. 
The question naturally arises as to whether it is advisable that 
air in a museum case shall remain unchanged ; this is an aspect 
of the question I do not profess to have studied, but there is one 
very apparent advantage. In warm climates great trouble is 
caused by those museum depredators, moths, and particularly the 
beetles Anthrenus and Dermestes ; the exhibits have to be con- 
stantly handled, and the depredators destroyed. In a case 
constructed as before suggested, in which no interchange of air 
takes place, the contained air could be poisoned, and would so 
remain for a long period. 
On the SEASONAL CHANGES in the PLUMAGE of 
ZOSTEROPS GAJRULESGENS . 
By Alfred J. North, E.L.S. 
(Ornithologist to the Australian Museum). 
In describing Zostercps ivesternensis of Quoy and Gaimard in 
the <c Catalogue of Birds in the British Museum,”* Hr. R. Bowdler 
Sharpe makes the following observations : — “ An Australian speci- 
men has been described, and it is extraordinary that a bird which 
seems to be widely distributed on that continent should so much 
have escaped notice, the only allusion to the species that I can 
find in Mr. Gould’s work being a passage where he mentions that 
some specimens of Z. ccerulescens have the c throat wax-yellow/ 
It seems to be the Z. westernensis (Q. & G.), a species re-instated 
in the system by Dr. Hartlaub (J. f. 0. 1865) p. 20.” 
With a view of solving the mystery why so common a species 
should have been overlooked by most writers, I have given this 
subject my attention for the past two years, by careful observa- 
tion and the collecting of a number of specimens of Zoster ops 
found in the neighbourhood of Sydney. For a liberal supply of 
these birds every month, from January until the end of August, 
the thanks of the Trustees are chiefly due to Mr. H. J. Acland, 
of Greendale, and for a small series of Tasmanian skins to Mr. 
E. Leefe Atkinson, of Table Cape. Mr. J. A. Thorpe, the Taxi- 
dermist, too, has assisted at various times, and from the specimens 
# Sharpe, Cat. Bds. Brit. Mus. ix., p. 156 (1881). 
