THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
part of Western Australia. The ‘ brown ’ may reproduce a broTsn or a parti¬ 
coloured bird, as in Victoria. Judging by specimens collected in Western 
Australia by the writer, the rufous bird may reproduce a much paler and greyer- 
brown bird than itself. Still one meets many rufous birds, parents and young, 
and many greyish-brown birds, parents and young, and they may be broadly 
spoken of as the ‘ Rufous ’ and the ‘ Brown ’ varieties. Naturally the former 
is more a desert form.” 
Wliitlock wrote : “ Tliis species was sparingly distributed over aU those 
parts of Barrow Island I visited. It appears to be a Hghter-coloured form of 
the mainland species, the dark centres to the feathers being ill-defined and 
paler. It is probably identical mth a variety recently described by jVIt. G. M. 
Mathews [error, should be Montague] from the Slontebello Group. I found 
two nests, each contaming three eggs. They were both constructed outwardly 
of grasses and lined with a httle wallaby fur. One was m a cavity of the rocky 
flooring of an islet, the other m a patch of heath-hke plants growing just 
above high-tide line.” 
Campbell reported upon this as follows: “On accomit of the variable 
colour of its plumage, the Anthus is always puzzling, Whitlock collected three 
specimens (IcJ, 29$), each from both Dirk Hartog and Barrow' Islands. Carter 
believed there was a subspecific difference in the former birds, and named them 
hartogi ; but a pair from Kow Plauis, Victoria, can hardly be separated from 
hartogi, and with the same wing (82 mm.). Ogilvie-Grant did not recognise, 
any difference in the Bernier Island bii’d to the common Anthus. The Barrow 
(Island) birds are, however, redder in colour*, more hke the tone of Ilirafra 
woodwardi from Cossack and contiguous mainland—and most resemble siibrufus 
(Mathews). A. montebelli (Mathew's, i.e. Montague) from Montabello Islands, 
near Barrow, is, no doubt, similar to the BarroAV bird, and consequently also 
to subrujus.” 
As regards the various subspecies of this form, Gould long ago wrote: 
“ Whether tliis Old World form (the genus Anthus) is represented in Austraha 
by more than a single species is a pomt I have not satisfactorily determined; 
every paid of its extra-tropical regions, mcluding Tasmania, is inhabited by 
Pipits which differ somewhat m size in almost every colony ; stiU their difference 
is so slight that I have hitheido regarded and stOl consider them to be mere 
varieties or local races of one and the same species.” 
Campbell also noted: “ The Gromid Larks from Tasmania and islands 
in Bass Strait are larger than the maurland bird, so much so that they may 
almost be considered a local variety, the eggs, too, bemg larger.” 
Notwithstanduig these statements no subspecies were recognised when 
I prepared my “ Reference List ” in 1912, but upon examining my collection 
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