August 1922 
The Queensland Naturalist- 
99 
the parts as they were issued, but the work was never com- 
pleted. It was a hard blow to Higgles, and he says as much 
in an introduction to papers read before the Queensland 
Philosophical Society on 29th January, 1874. Seven years 
had then gone by since he had been compelled to discontinue 
his work by the subscribers' list falling suddenly from 
ninety to sixty, and Higgles saw “little immediate hope of a 
change, so far as bringing out or continuing the work in 
this country is concerned, and the greater is the pity. . . ” 
From this Higgles goes on to discuss the Albert Lyre- 
bird, and gives some extraordinary information conveyed 
to him by J. T. Cockerell. The latter, it appears, went to 
the Coomera Ranges in 1873 for the purpose of procuring 
specimens of Menura albert i (then but recently discovered) r 
and became interested in a mound upon which he saw a 
male bird. This structure “looked like the mound of a 
Tallegalla, but was not so large, and differed in having no 
sticks in its composition. It was a much neater structure. ’ r 
Some aboriginals, it is added, “confirmed Mr. Cockerell’s 
suspicions, and asserted positively that the mound was 
doubtless the workmanship of the bird which he had shot— 
a fact which had been long known to them — that the eggs 
were three in number, and were deposited at a depth of a 
foot or so, were cream coloured, spotted with brown, and 
not so large as those of the Turkey, as they call it. They 
informed Mr. Cockerell that the habit of the birds was to 
make a tunnel right through the mound, so that the young 
might make their exit at either side. The mound is fre- 
quently resorted to by the young birds, and Mr. Arthur 
Binstead, assisted by some sawyers, some time ago, watched 
their opportunity and captured four after they had entered 
the mound. Mr. Binstead took them home and reared them 
without difficulty. ’ ’ 
It is now well known, of course, that all species of 
Lyre-birds build nests of sticks, in no way resembling the 
slight mounds upon which the male birds play, and that, 
moreover, there is only one egg to a clutch in each case. 
This being borne in mind, it is evident that J. T. Cockerell, 
and through him Silvester Higgles, were the victims of the 
aboriginals and sawyers of the Coomera in a most elaborate 
bit of ornithological “ leg-pulling.”* 
"With Coxen and Diggles may be associated Waller, 
Spalding, and Cockerell. Of the last-mentioned worker. 
* Worthy tu rank with this Lyre-bird information is a “ dis- 
covery ’ 1 made by A. C. Grant, author of “Bush Life in Queensland .’ 9 
He speaks of the great size of the nesting mound of the Brush 
Turkey, and casually adds, “thirty or forty lay their eggs in it! “ 
