WHITE-PLUMED HONEY-EATER. 
From the East Murchison, Whitlock added : “I hardly expected to meet 
with this species so far inland, but I even found a pair or two within a stone’s 
throw of the main street in Wiluna. At Milly Pool it was common, and I 
found nests containing eggs and also young. I saw some evidence in the presence 
of immature birds with pale brown beaks of this species having bred during 
the summer rains. These immature birds were observed near Wiluna in July.” 
Macgillivray, under the name Ptilotis leilava'ensis, wrote: “ Numerous 
throughout the Gulf country in eucalypts and tea-tree. One nest was found 
containing eggs on the 18th March. In habits they resemble closely P. 
penicillata of southern latitudes.” 
Cleland has stated that he met with it at Queenscliff, Kangaroo Island, 
but the record does not appear to have been confirmed by Captain S. A. White, 
Mr. J. W. Mellor, or others. 
Gould named this species from the interior of New South Wales and then 
found it common in South Australia. It was not subdivided into races nor 
were such indicated when simultaneously in 1899 North described a form from 
the Leilavale Station, thirty miles south of Cloncurry in the Burke District, 
Central Queensland, as a distinct species with the name Ptilotis leilavalensis, 
and A. J. Campbell described specimens from North-west Cape, Mid-west 
Australia, as a new species, Ptilotis carteri. 
Immediately these two forms were recognised as generally agreeing and 
by some were even synonymised. Thus Hall recorded a bird from Derby under 
the name P. leilavalensis, regarding P. carteri as synonymous ; but Milligan 
pointed out a number of differences and even suggested that the mid-west 
bird might be a southern race of P. flavescens, and then from Yandanooka, about 
260 miles north of Perth, wrote as follows : iC Ptilotis carteri (Campbell). These 
birds were invariably found in the ‘ York gum ’ belts, both at Yandanooka 
and Ebano. In habit and disposition they are restless and pugnacious, chasing 
each other from tree to tree in noisy quaiTel. They have a habit similar to 
that of Ptilotis ornata (which they resemble in their notes and general charac¬ 
teristics) of rising frequently into the air from the top of a tree, uttering a 
distinct note. We seemed a series of some twelve skins, and in every one 
(except a fledgling) the black auricular line and yellow throat and chest striations 
. . . were always present and conspicuous. Lately I ha\e had the oppor 
tarty of comparing the above with two skins of Ptilotis leilavalensis (North) 
from the Carpentaria district, kindly lent by Dr. W. McGillivray, and in neit er 
of these skins do the black line and striations appear. The white plumes 
the latter, also, are less strongly developed. I have therefore not the s lg itest 
hesitation in pronouncing the two species distinct. Fortunately, v en 
making the comparison, Mr. Tom Carter, formerly of Point Cloates, was on a 
557 
