ORIOLE. 
season, the Oriole amuses itself by imitating the calls of other brush birds. 
Among the bird calls which are imitated to perfection by this mimic may be 
mentioned the Magpie, Black-throated Butcher-Bird, Eriar-Bird, Magpie-Lark, 
Drongo, Macleay Khigfisher, Black-faced and Little Cuckoo-Slurikes, Whistling 
Eagle, Goshawk, Blue-faced Honey-eater, Fig-Bird and many others. Its 
suspended open nest is a bulky structure of tea-tree bark, and similar in size 
and shape to that of the Friar-Bird, but easily distmguishable by its untidy 
appearance.” 
Accompanying this note was published a delightful little photo of three 
young nearly fledged Orioles perched on a branch. 
This species was given two names by Latham, as shown in the 
synonymy, naming it as the Striated Roller and then again as the Green 
Grakle, m neither case stating the somce of his description. 
G. R. Gray recognised two Lambert drawings as being thus named by 
Latham, deternuning the former as Mimeta viridis ?, the latter as Mimeta 
viridis King, overlooking the fact that the former had precedence. 
Sharpe, in his exposition of the Watling drawings, regarded: 
“No. 67. Southern Oriole, Latham MS.” and 
“ No. 69. Green Grakle Latham ” 
as being this bird and noted : “ Latham does not seem to have recognised the 
identity of Nos. 67 and 69,” and continued the usage oi Oriolus viridis ex Latham. 
The fact that sagittatus was the correct name was not even realised when 
Robinson and Laverock in 1900 pointed out that in The Catalogue of the Birds 
in the British Museum the name Gracula viridis was made use of twice, once 
for the Oriole, the other time for the Cat-Bird. They therefore proposed to 
use the name viridis for the Cat-Bird and make use of the name sagittata for 
the Oriole. This was not exactly right, as viridis was based on the Oriole 
and could not be used for the Cat-Bird, but neither could it be continued 
for the Oriole, as sagittatus was earlier and was also given to the Oriole. 
I pointed this out in my “Reference List” in 1912, when I placed the 
specific names correctly and these have not since been altered. 
As regards the subspecific forms there was confusion for a long time imtil 
the publication of my “Reference List.” In the Introduction to his Birds 
of Australia, published in 1848, Goidd proposed a new species, Orioltcs affinis, 
writing: “ Inhabits the neighbourhood of Port Essington, and only differs 
from the preceding species {0. viridis) in having a smaller body, a shorter wing, 
a much larger biU, and in the white spots at the tip of the lateral tail-feathers 
bemg much smaller in extent.” 
Sharpe, in The Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum,Yo\. 3, in 1877, 
did not recognise this, suggesting it was the immature of the succeeding species. 
VOL. xn. 
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