THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
variations “ irides and feet black ” for the former, and “ irides brown ; feet 
blackish-grey ” for the latter. 
Sharpe when dealing with the “Alert” Collections recorded that these 
were difficult to separate, even if separable. Hartert in 1905 wrote : “ Myiagra 
rubecula concinna Gould (?) It seems that male specimens from N.W. Australia 
as well as those from Cape York, have always a blackish loral line, while this 
is not pronounced in those from Queensland, N.S. Wales, Victoria, nor in those 
from the Louisiades. But this form is not easily, and perhaps not always, 
distinguishable ; moreover, the females appear to be quite alike.” 
In the Nov. Zool., Vol. XXV., p. 316, 1918, Rothschild and Hartert have 
discussed these forms and have concluded that there are two species, as follows : 
“ Myiagra rubecula was described from New South Wales, Myiagra concinna 
Gould 1848 from Port Essington. As in each of these two localities only one 
form is found, we can apply these names with certainty. Mr. Mathews treats 
concinna as a subspecies of rubecula, but this view cannot be upheld, as at 
Cape York and a great part of (Northern) Queensland, rubecula and concinna 
occur, at various seasons, side by side. This is surprising, as the two species 
are so much alike. In fact, the only difference which we have found between 
the males is that the male of M. rubecula has the lores deep grey or slate colour, 
that of concinna has them velvety-black, and the lores are in the latter 
connected by a narrow black line across the fore-head, just above the bill, while 
this line is not conspicuously developed in M. rubecula. Moreover, the bill is 
generally wider in rubecula, narrower in concinna. There is apparently no 
difference at all between the females, except that there as well the bill is as a 
rule narrower in concinna, wider in rubecula ; this difference in the bill is quite 
evident if good series of males and females (as far as they are certain, 
i.e., coming from localities where only one of the forms occur) are compared, 
but it is variable and not easily measured. We agree with Mathews that 
Platyrhynchos ruficollis Vieillot, Myiagra rubiculoides Vig. and Horsf., and 
Myiagra plumbea of the same authors, all from N.S. Wales, are synonyms of 
rubecula, and to these we must add M. rubecula ringwoodi Math., as the 
supposed difference, i.e., “ much greyer upper-surface ” does not hold good. 
Mathews also described a Myiagra rubecula yorlci, of which he thought that it 
was smaller, wing 75 mm. This he described erroneously, as some Cape York 
specimens are rather long winged, with a wing of fully 80 mm., while many, 
if not more than half the typical rubecula have wings no longer and sometimes 
even shorter than 75 mm. Moreover, the type of M. yorhi is a black-lored 
concinna ! It should, however, provisionally be kept separate, because it has 
the bill on the average wider than typical concinna, and, as a rule, about as 
wide as in rubecula. At Cape York occur also M. rubecula with slate-grey 
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