The Satin Bower-Bird. 
263 
THE SATIN BOWER-BIRD. 
( Ptilonorhynchus holoscriceus.) 
This singular bird was first brought before the notice 
of the public by Mr. Gould, in his splendid work, the 
" Birds of Australia," from which the following extracts 
are given by permission of its author. The most remark- 
able circumstance relating to this bird, is its construction 
of a bower-like tenement, the object of which, it should 
seem, is a sort of playing-ground, or hall of assembly. 
"The Satin Bower-bird, " says Mr. Gould, "is not a 
stationary species, but appears to range from one part of 
a district to another, either for the purpose of varying 
the nature, or of obtaining a more' abundant supply of 
food. Judging from the many specimens I dissected, it 
would seem that it is altogether granivorous and fru- 
givorous ; or, if not exclusively so, that insects form but 
a small portion of its diet. The brushes it inhabits are 
studded with enormous fig-trees, some of them towering 
to the height of two hundred feet; among the lofty 
branches of which the Satin Bower-bird finds, in the 
