16 
MacGILUVKAY. S.ir. Queensland. [ m iSg." 
and showing much variation in colour. The flowers were honeyr 
laden, and had attracted a number of honey-eating birds, and 
as they have a long flowering period, the birds were nesting, or 
preparing to do so.. Pied (Certhionyx variegatus ), Black 
(Myzomela nigra), White-fronted (Glyciphila albifrons ), White- 
plumed, Spiny-cheeked and Singing Iioneyeaters were seen and 
heard on all sides. The White-fronted had nests in course of 
construction, some containing fresh eggs, and others young birds 
in all stages from recently hatched fledglings to fully fledged 
birds just leaving the nest. The Black Honeyeaters were in 
pairs, but, being a little too early, we did not find any nests. We 
later found one nest of the Pied Honeyeater containing two eggs, 
and on the following day the clutch was completed. This was 
the only, nest of this species found. It was an open cup-shaped 
structure composed of dried stalks of herbage and rootlets, and 
was lined with fine rootlets and placed at about one foot from 
the ground in a dead Ercmophila niaculata, through which was 
growing Enchylaena tomentosa with red berries, and a beautiful 
white Brachycome. The nest measured, in millimetres: outside 
diameter, 90 ; inside, 60 ; outside depth, 47 ; inside, 35 . 
The nests of the White-fronted Honeyeater (Glyciphila albi¬ 
frons) were placed, one in an Acacia catw, at about three feet 
from the ground, another in a Pimelea, well concealed, at about 
the same height, and the rest in Ercmophila maculata, at on an 
average about one foot from the ground; they were usually well 
concealed. The open nests were cup-shaped, composed of small 
Malles of dried herbage and grasses and lined with the down from 
the seeds of Senccio gregorii. In a pair of young a few days 
old, the skin was leaden-coloured on the feather tracts, lighter 
on other parts, with ashy-coloured down on head, dorsal, humeral, 
and femoral tracts; bill pale brown, gape yellow, irides hazel, and 
legs pale slate. Three nests of the Singing Honeyeater (Meli- 
phaga virescens) were found, all containing fresh eggs. One of 
these in an Acacia cana was beautifully constructed almost wholly 
of sheep’s wool. A Spotted Nightjar was flushed from a gullv 
in a stony hill at the back of the camp. 
We left camp late on the 19 th, and stopped at Morden Station 
for the night. During the evening Air. White, the manager, 
asked me: Did you ever hear of a bird covering her eggs over?” 
He then proceeded to relate that about six weeks previously when 
driving sheep out near Lake Elder Station, his attention was 
attracted to a small dun-coloured bird which seemed to be brush¬ 
ing the ground with its wings in front of the advancing sheep. 
On going over she flew away, and he found three eggs on the 
ground. They were covered with sand and pebbles and other 
debris, so that only a small portion of one remained visible. The 
bird from his description was an Australian Dotterel (Pcltohyas 
australis). This habit has been noted before, but I have witnessed 
