ALEXANDRA PARROT. 
30' and Long. 134°, the type specimens were obtained at “ Howell’s Ponds,” 
in Lat. about 17° and Long. 133°, the distance between the two places 
being about 600 miles. The total length of the living birds is about 151- 
inches, the tail being about 10 inches ; the sexes both immature are at 
present alike in plumage, the female being only slightly duller than the 
male. In P. barrdbandii the tail measures 9.4 inches, and that of P. melanura 
9.2 inches in length. Two of the type specimens described by Gould appear 
to have been lost ; if so the only remaining one would be that in the Bobroyde 
Collection referred to above. None of these yet obtained appear to be fully 
adult, but when the adult male is found it will probably prove to be a much 
more beautiful bird than those figured in Gould’s Supplement to the Birds of 
Australia. 
The “ J. S. Clarke ” referred to may be an error for “ Mr. M. Symonds 
Clark,” who was really the re-discoverer of this parrot. My friend has sent me 
a typewritten copy of “ Some Further Notes on our Native Parrots, read at a 
meeting of the Field Naturalists’ Section of the Royal Society of South 
Australia, September 20, 1898.” From this I extract the following : “I 
think I may fairly claim that my having drawn attention to the species led to 
several other specimens being brought to Adelaide. In 1891, Hr. Stirling, 
while accompanying Lord Kintore across from Port Harwin to Adelaide, shot 
three specimens near Newcastle Waters, one of which was lost in the long 
grass, but the skins of the other two were brought to the Museum. In 1894, 
the members of the Horn Expedition to the MacDonnell Ranges, obtained, 
I believe, fifteen specimens. In that same year, or early in 1895, these birds 
visited the Hale River district in larger numbers and bred there. Many were 
caught and Mr. Winnecke, the leader of the Horn Expedition, had thirty of 
them sent down to him in Adelaide. I saw them at his office, in March, 
1895. . . . Besides those sent to Mr. Winnecke, I saw in March and April, 
1895, eight more specimens and Hr. Perk’s had four others. Mr. Keartland, 
who went with the Calvert Expedition across to North-west Australia in 1896, 
obtained several skins, so that the species is now tolerably well-known.” 
Just previously North had proposed for the species the genus name 
Spathopterus from examination of specimens procured by the Horn Scientific 
Expedition to Central Australia and gave Heartland’s notes. Later Keartland 
himself gave some more notes concerning its distribution : “ The range of this 
species has been traced from about 100 miles east of Alice Springs in Northern 
Territory to near Mount Bates in Western Australia, and from J oanna Springs 
in the North-west to the Finke River, at Crown Point, in the southern part 
of the Northern Territory. Buring the greater part of the year they are in 
flocks scattered over the most desert-like portions of the interior, where they 
vol. vi. 273 
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