I 
THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
in low gums. They sat in rows, close together, as many as seven or eight being 
counted in one row ; twenty to thirty were seen thus roosting for several nights 
in one small sapling. As the nights were very cold this may have been for 
warmth, or it may have been the congregating together before proceeding 
south. In September and October much fewer birds were seen, and these 
usually in pairs, the rest having evidently gone south. These pairs were 
nesting on the 22nd September, 1907, in a sandbank at the Strelly River. 
The tunnel ran about three feet in bank : four eggs partly incubated on the 
bare sand at the end of the tunnel, which was slightly widened. A few small 
land-snail shells and wasps’ wings formed the nest. Oct. 10, 1908 : First 
seen at Perth this year.” 
Mr. J. P. Rogers’ notes are also valuable : “ (Parry’s Creek), March 16, 
1909 : Very numerous and in flocks sometimes. July 12, 1909, Mary 
River, 290 miles south of Wyndham : Very rare, only one pair seen. At 
Marngle Creek this species was very numerous. I often saw small flocks 
particularly on the sand-hills. At Mungi it was also numerous. I have 
never seen this bird nesting in Kimberley. . . . Nov. 27, 1911, Cooper’s 
Camp, Melville Island : To-day I collected the only ones seen to date. 
The next were seen on Jan. 2, 1912, 10 miles S.E. of Snake Bay, and 
I saw apparently the same birds the following day, but did not see them 
again until I left this locality. On the 24th January, 1912, back at Cooper’s 
Camp, I found these birds sparingly distributed and I saw them afterwards 
every day, until on Feb. 4 I noted : ‘ this species appears to be increasing 
numbers now,’ and on the 9th Feb. ‘ Now very numerous : to-day I saw 
many birds.’ . . .” With the preceding contrast the same observer’s notes, 
taken at Thursday Island, just previously : “ September 10, 1911. To-day 
many Bee-eaters were seen on migration from the islands to the north: were 
all travelling in a southerly direction, one little flock behind another. On the 
11th, at Thursday Island, many himdreds of Bee-eaters passed over, aU 
making for the mainland of Cape York. On the 12th I left Thursday Island 
at 4 p.m. for Port Darwin. This day I saw many at the Island, and at dusk 
a flock Ut on the ship. Next day three were on the rigging. These were the 
last seen.” 
My last quotation will be read with interest by those who have 
carefully perused the preceding. Campbell and Barnard, in the Emu 
(Vol. XVII., p. 17, 1917) wrote : “ Common about Cardwell in September, 
where they arrived from the north. They seemed to be moving southward. 
The first one we observed was on the 11th September. Broadbent first 
noticed Bee-eaters on 19th August ‘in little flocks.’ In October he saw 
them flying over CardweU in thousands for days, going southward. 
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