SQUARE-TAILED (BRUSH) CUCKOO. 
pygia) and eggs of the Narrow-billed Bronze Cuckoo in nests of the Chestnut- 
mmped Ground- Wren and Tawny-crowned Honey-eater {Glyciphila fulvifrons). 
At Ringwood most of my excursions were in company with Messrs. Howe 
and A. C. Stone. We observed that, of the above-mentioned species of Cuckoos, 
only the Black-eared was missing, but the Square-tailed {G. variolosus) was 
there in addition. Throughout October and November it was an unusual thing 
to find a nest of certain species of birds which did not contain a Cuckoo’s egg. 
For the first time during an experience extending over several years, I found 
eggs of the Square-tailed Cuckoo. Almost every nest of the Scarlet-breasted 
Robin {Petroica leggii) contained an egg of the Square-tailed Cuckoo or of the 
Narrow-billed Bronze Cuckoo. Five cases of the former were recorded, and the 
same number of the latter. In the cases of the Square-tailed Cuckoo one nest 
held an egg of the Robin, another two eggs of the Robin, a third three eggs of 
the Robin, and a fourth two young Robins ; while in the last case the egg of the 
Cuckoo had been placed in the nest before building was complete and had 
been covered with the fining.” 
Although so little has been recorded of the habits of this Cuckoo, H. L. 
White gives the following fist of foster-parents of its eggs {Emu, Vol. XIV., 
p. 149, 1915) : “ Microeca fascinans, Kempia flavigaster, Petroica multicolor, 
Littlera chrysoptera, Belchera rosea, Whiteornis goodenovii, Oerygone olivacea, 
Wilsonavis fusca, Rhipidura flabellifera, Howeavis rufifrons, Setosura setosa, 
Leucocirca tricolor, Myiagra rubecula, PiezorJiynchus alecto, Monarcha melanopsis, 
Acanthiza pusilla, Sericornis longirostris, 8. magnirostris, Malurus cyaneus, 
M. coronatus, Leggeornis lamherti, Ryania cyanocephala, Pachycephala pectoralis, 
Eopsaltria australis, Amytornis woodwardi, Ramsayornis fasciatus, R. modestus, 
Paraptilotis chrysops, Ptilotula flavescens, Broadbentia flava, Conopophila rufo- 
gularis and Neositta chrysoptera. 
The nomenclature of this species is just as much involved as any of the 
other Australian Cuckoos. As noted above, Gould did not notice that he was 
re-naming Vigors and Horsfield’s species, and Shelley, in the Catalogue of the 
Birds in the British Museum, Vol. XIX., was careless of names as well as facts 
where African birds were not concerned. Consequently, when he noted the 
identity of the earlier name, he synonymised it wrongly, utilising “ C. 
variolosus — G. tymbonomus = C. dumetorum ” and “ G. insperatus — G, assimilis 
= G. infaustus.^^ As C. insperatus was described from the type locality of 
G. variolosus, a rearrangement was necessary. North indicated the confusion 
in 1906, and in 1912 I reviewed the forms in a short article in the Austral 
Avian Record, Vol. I., pt. 1, 1912. I there concluded that Cuculus pyrro- 
phanus Vieillot was referable to this species, but Pucheran had stated that it 
came from “ Java,” not New Holland as given in the original description. 
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