THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
with feathers, and eggs vary from one to five. These birds have developed a 
habit of attacking the imported House-Sparrows’ nests, pulling out the young 
ones and destroying the nests ; this is rendering a great service to the country, 
seeing that the imported Sparrows are such a pest. They have a great range 
of notes, long-drawn whistles, scolding call like a cat, chattering, etc.” 
Mr. Edwin Ashby’s notes read: “Very common in the great belt of 
Mallee between the River Murray and the Victorian Border ; also very 
numerous on the lower parts of the Mount Lofty Range and Yorke’s Peninsula. 
I also met with it at a place called Callion not far from Coolgardie, West 
Australia. This species is one of the most interesting and valuable of our 
feathered friends ; in my garden at Blackwood mobs of something like a dozen 
(which suggests the name of ‘ The Twelve Apostles,’ by which they are often 
known) work together, moving with rapid hops from bush to bush and bed to 
bed, turning over the leaves, sticks, etc., often throwing them a foot or more, 
digging away for insects with their sharp beaks in the soft soil under the debris 
for worms and insects. Their motions are restless in the extreme, keeping 
up an incessant chatter interspersed with frequent scolding notes. They 
never stay long enough to clear up the insect pests at one place, for if one bird 
is a little in front of the others those behind leave whatever they are working 
on directly the foremost bird is on good spoil. If possible they hop from 
clump to clump in huge hops which has earned for them another name, 4 The 
Kangaroo Bird.’ When a flock moves from one She-Oak to another they 
usually alight some yard or so from the trunk, hop, as described, to the base, 
and then commence mounting the boughs in a kind of spiral, a sort of follow- 
my-leader method.” 
Mr. Tom Carter has sent me the following note : “ The Carnarvon Babbler 
is very common in the Gascoyne and other districts of mid-West Australia, 
in all the thickets, and dense scrub about the beds of the large rivers. They 
were never seen at Point Cloates, owing to the scarcity of scrub, but were to 
be seen about thirty miles inland from there where the usual inland vegetation 
prevails. They are very active, garrulous birds, going about in family (?) 
parties of five or six, feeding on the ground (where they progress with rapid 
hops) or in the bushes. They do not seem to feed in trees or at any great 
distance from the ground. The nests are made of twigs, lined with grass and 
roots, and are very bulky for the size of the birds. They are usually dome- 
shaped with entrance near the summit. The breeding-season varies as to 
how rain falls or not, but July to September are the main months. Clutch 
of eggs three to four. September 23, 1913 : Nest with three fresh eggs at 
Carnarvon. Sept. 19, 1911 : Young at Carnarvon. The Babblers in the 
south-west and around Broome Hill are considerably larger than the Carnarvon 
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