August. IQ22 
The Queensland Naturalist. 
IQI 
of tli^ Regent-bird. and many other valuable little “finds.’' 
Among them was a Grass-Owl shot near Brisbane), which 
Biggies described as Stri.r ic alien, but which was after- 
wards sunk as a synonym for Strix Candida . It would be 
interesting, by the way. to know what became of 'Waller’s 
collection. Was it. or any portion thereof, contained in 
the ‘‘many valuable specimens’ ’ lost on the ship Fiery Star, 
when that vessel wa^ burnt on her voyage to England on 
19th April, I860? Waller and his artistic ^on continued 
to send bird skins and paintings to Gould up to about 1S75 
(see Birds of A etc Guinea : shortly afterwards. I believe, 
he left. Brisbane for England, and did not return. 
Edward Spalding was another collector whose name 
was applied by Gould to a Queensland bird. Here I 
cannot do better than quote a personal note given me by 
Mr. J. O'Neil Brenan. “When I was quite young/ ’ Mr. 
Bren an says. “Ned Spalding's father kept a ‘pub' on the 
bullock-road between Petersham (N.S.W.) and the Glebe 
Island abattoirs. Spalding, senr.. was, I think, a picture- 
frame maker by trade, and so was Ned; but they were both 
collectors and taxidermists, too. Before coming to the 
Queensland Museum as taxidermist, Spalding went vari- 
ous trips collecting. He made several trips for the late 
Sir Wm. McLeay, to whose private museum he was attached. 
One of these trips was to North Queensland, where he 
discovered the ‘ Chow-chilla/ or Blackheaded Log-runner, 
which bears his name/' . . After a short spell at the 
McLeay museum, Spalding came to our museum, and 
remained with us until 1893-94, when he fell a victim to 
the pruning-knife of a Treasurer suffering from financial 
hysterics. ' ’ 
(To be Continued). 
0 
KOOKABURRA PRANKS. 
The Kookaburra or Laughing Jackass, the cheerful 
feathered friend of the bushman, is one of Australia’s most 
valuable birds, destroying as he does great numbers of 
snakes and other vermin. But there are occasions when 
Jacky can make himself a positive nuisance. I remember 
one of these birds which suddenly evinced a decided 
preference for chickens as an article of diet, and made 
serious inroads into a brood. I had the hen and chickens 
shut up in a wire coop, but unfortunately the mesh was a 
Orthonyx spaldingi. 
