3 
heard at intervals all through the night, particularly if it has been 
bright moonlight, the sharp, clear call-note of the pair from their 
roosting place, breaking the silence of the night, like the old 
watchman^s cry of bygone times of All’s well.” 
As Mr. Wagtail is preening himself in the morning sun, his restless 
black tail is constantly on the wag, from which he gets his other 
common name of ^‘Willie Wagtail”; but he is not a true wagtail; 
and, though he resembles the pied wagtails of Europe in outward 
appearance and colouration, he is a fly-catcher, and instead of 
wagging his tail up and down our friend flirts it in the opposite way, 
from side to side. He has had a number of other popular names 
given to him by different writers, which may be more accurate from 
a scientific point of view, such as Black Fantail, Black and White 
Fantail, Water Fantail, but they will never supplant the good old 
bush names of Shepherd’s Companion” and ‘^Willie Wagtail.” 
Gould says that the natives of Western Australia called this bird 
“ Jit-te Jet-te,” which is evidently their interpretation of its call-note. 
It was described a great many years ago by two naturalists, Messrs. 
Vigours and Horsfell, under the scientific name of Rhipidura 
motocilloides, the first or generic name being compounded of two 
Greek words, Rhipis a fan, and Oura a tail, and the second or specific 
name from the Latin word motacilla a wagtail, thus translated the 
Fantail Fly-catcher.” 
They are dainty artificers, constructing a beautiful, soft, cup-shaped 
nest composed of grass, bits of bark, wool, hair, and any other 
suitable material they 
come across in their 
rambles, delicately 
woven together into 
a soft, felted mass, 
bound all over and 
around with spider¬ 
web, so that when 
their labours are 
finished it is so neatly 
attached to the limb 
that it has no angles 
or sharp outlines, 
but blends into its 
surroundings so 
thoroughly that you 
would never suspect 
that it was a nest, but 
pass it quite closely, 
under the impression that it was simply an excrescence or lump on 
the limb. 
The choice of situation of the nest is guided by the surroundings^ 
but where the writer was well acquainted with Willie Wagtail,” in 
the north-western district of Victoria, it was generally placed on a 
dead limb standing out of a living tree; and if the birds were out 
