THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
constructed, being beautifully decorated with green lichen. The nests found 
were all placed in thick growths of the parasitical dodder, and were lined 
with the fine needles of a species of Casuarina growing close by.” 
In this connection I may note that North called the Adelaide bird P. 
meridionalis, but the name had been previously used as given in the synony m y. 
L. G. Chandler also used P. meridionalis in writing of the Kow Plains 
form : “ On any ridge where the mallee or tea-tree was covered with a growth 
of parasitical dodder we met with specimens of this bird. At the same time, 
the species is by no means plentiful. The nest in every case was placed in 
dodder. On one occasion a male bird was found breeding in immature plumage.” 
Concerning the birds of Eyre’s Peninsula, Hall has written : “ I have not 
marked this bird P. meridionalis, because it appears to differ, even though it 
be slightly. The eastern P. pectoralis is deeper in shade of colour than 
P. meridionalis or the Eyre’s Peninsula bird, yet they appear to be races of it, 
just as P. occidentalis is considered to be a race of P. pectoralis. P. meridionalis 
appears to be the connecting link between the Eastern and Western forms. 
The tails of the two specimens secured did not agree with each other. The 
tail of one had black faintly and indefinitely placed upon it, while on the other 
the basal half was grey.” 
The Eyre’s Peninsula bird represents the name P. fuliginosa Vigors and 
Horsfield, and I am allowing this to indicate a distinct subspecies closer to 
P. occidentalis than to eastern races. 
The peculiar Australian forms known as Thickheads have had a curious 
history. The two common species were first named by Latham from the 
Watling drawings, and because these had been painted by different artists 
he did not recognise them at all easily, and therefore he named each of them 
twice, the first in T urdus and Muscicapa, the other in Sylvia and T urdus. Lewin 
confused the names, or perhaps selected the same name for one of the species, 
but not the one Latham so named. His generic choice was Turdus. Shaw 
renamed the Yellow -breasted species, probably from a specimen, but placed it 
in the genus Motacilla. Stephens simply changed the name while placing the 
species in the genus Turdus again. 
Vieillot, the ornithologist, probably having birds before him, noting the 
peculiar bills, placed them in his genus Laniarius, of course providing new 
specific names as he did not recognise in them the species named by Latham. 
Then apparently Swainson, with his keen appreciation of generic differences, 
named the birds as a distinct genus but only in manuscript, and allowed Vigors 
to publish it, and then Vigors and Horsfield used it in their “ Essay on Australian 
Birds,” when they admitted seven species, four of which they introduced as new, 
but misused one of Latham’s names for the different species ; and also included 
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