VARIEGATED WREN. 
yards from the open sea. September 28th, 1911. Eledged young noted at 
Carnarvon.” 
Mr. J. P. Rogers wrote me : “ This species was first seen in the desert four 
miles east of Mungi, when it was seen on several occasions. The next locality 
was Endralla Spring, Eitzroy River, fourteen miles west of Mt. Anderson. 
Some years ago I collected similar birds from Mount Wynne, Eitzroy River, 
100 miles inland ; from a station thirty miles from Broome on the Derby road, 
and from the Stewart River, 100 miles north of Derby. It is a rare bird in all 
the localities named in West Kimberley. These are the birds recorded by Hall 
in the Emu” 
Whitlock, writing of the Birds of the Pilbarra Goldfields, recorded: “This 
( assimilis ) was the Malurus of the district, but in no instance did I find it far 
from the main river. In July the males were assuming full plumage, and building 
operations commenced at the end of the month. I saw not the slightest evidence 
of polygamy in the case of this species. This Malurus is double-brooded.” 
Carter has recorded concerning the Birds of Dirk Hartog Island and Peron 
Peninsula : “ Red- winged or Western Blue-breasted Wrens were common 
on Dirk Hartog Island and were much tamer in disposition than either 
Hallornis cyanotus or Nesomalurus l. leucopterus. The full-plumaged males 
of all three of these species are always much wilder and more wary than the 
females or immature males, but the adults of the species now under considera- 
tion are tame as compared with the others. Parties of females can always be 
4 chirped ’ close up, as long as one remains quiet, and after a little patient 
watching, the adult male can almost invariably be seen lurking in the foliage 
of a bush behind the rest of his family, and if one still refrains from moving, 
it will most probably emerge from its shelter and approach to within two or 
three feet, hopping about in a very confiding way. Sometimes when I have 
been watching a party of females and young birds for some time, and turned 
to move away, I would find the adult male was close behind me. Female birds 
are distinguished from the immature males by having dull red beaks and lores, 
and a patch of the same colour round the eye. The immature males lack this 
red coloration and have blackish beaks, while their general colouring is 
darker than that of the females. Females of the Black and White Wren and 
of Hallornis cyanotus also lack the red lores and mark around the eye. L. 1. 
occidentalis is a very silent bird, and I never heard any song from those seen 
on Dirk Hartog, nor yet from any of the hundreds I have met with in various 
localities of Mid-west Australia, from Shark’s Bay to North-west Cape. It 
seemed as if this species was partial to feeding in the scrub close to the 
beach, but many family parties were also seen further inland on the island. 
Very small, but exceedingly active young birds w r ere seen on October 13th, 1906, 
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