THE BIRDS OE AUSTRALIA. 
All of the nests are placed on the horizontal shrubby growth, and are a clear 
foot or more from the ground. The nest consists of a substantial interwoven 
platform of sticks, about 8 to 12 inches in diameter, depressed to about an 
inch in the centre for the reception of the single egg. The great majority 
(October 30) are occupied by fully-fledged young birds, most of them just 
ready to fly. Many have left the nest, and are roosting on the shrubby growdh 
round the old nests. There are very few small young birds, and still fewer 
eggs. The young are hatched out blind, with pale leaden-coloured skin, and 
with only an indication of down, distributed in the same way as in the other 
species, but with a very dark and shorter bill and dark mask, and this, instead 
of getting lighter as the bird grows older, gets darker, the bill and face of the 
fully-feathered young being almost black. The down on the nestling is also 
darker than in the other two kinds, and the fully-feathered young bird is of a 
dirty grey general colour, especially on the head, back, breast and abdomen, 
which is white in the adult. The bill and mask in the adult is creamy-white, 
with red border above the eyes and under the chin, and red legs. The legs 
of the mature young are leaden, with a tinge of pink. We find two adults, 
sitting on small young, with the bill and mask as in a mature adult, but 
with the general feathering of immaturity, leading us to believe that 
these birds do not attain to their mature plumage until two years at 
least have elapsed, and that they breed during the stage of immaturity. 
We cannot make this species leave their nests when sitting upon newly- 
hatched young.” 
Macgillivray {Emu, VoL XIII., p. 148, 1914) adds : “ On Raine Island, 
on 10th July, 1911, several nests with one egg in each and a few with one 
young bird. Great numbers of the birds were building.” 
The bird figured and described is a female collected on Raine Island, 
North Queensland, on 12th July, 1911, by Dr. W. Macgillivray, who gave it me. 
In the Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum, Vol. XXVI., p. 432, 
1898, Ogilvie-Grant used for this bird the name Sula piscator, basing it upon 
Linne’s {Syst. Nat., 12th ed., p. 217, 1766) Pelecanus piscator. 
In the American Ornithologists’ Union’s Checklist, 3rd ed., 1910, p. 61, 
the same name is used, the reference reading: '‘'‘Pelecanus piscator Linnseus, 
Syst. Nat., ed. 10, 1, 1758, 134 (China Sea).” I corrected the type locality 
to “ Java Seas ” in the Nov. Zool, Vol. XVIII., p. 242, 1912. 
I have now investigated this and give the details here so that the reader 
can follow the facts, the majority of the works consulted being rare. ^ 
Linne wrote {Syst. Nat., 10th ed., p. 134, 1758) : 
“ Pelecanus piscator. P. cauda cuneiform!, rostro serrato, remigibus 
omnibus nigris. Chin. Lagerstr. 8. Osb. iter 85. 
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