Vol ’i924 1V ’ ] MacGTLLIVRAY, S.ir. Queensland. 
19 
The post office is in New South Wales and the rest of the town 
in Queensland. We made a few enquiries at the hotel, and then 
crossed the Paroo again. It had here a wide bed with several 
small waterholes and a stream about a foot in width still gunning. 
We camped on ground that had been flooded; it made very hard 
bedding. 
Early next morning we heard from the trees along the river 
the wonderfully liquid and melodious notes of the Black-throated 
(Pied) Butcher-Birds and also those of the Harmonious (Grey) 
Thrush. Galahs were, as usual, numerous. These birds are in¬ 
creasing all through this country since the departure from their 
happy hunting grounds of the Aborigines, who, raiding all the 
creeks constantly for young birds, acted as a natural check to 
their increase. Ringnecks, White-shouldered Caterpillar-eaters, 
White-plumed, Black, and Spiny-cheeked Honeyeaters, and 
Yellow-throated Miners were common. Many pairs of White- 
browed Wood-Swallows were nesting. The Brown Weebill 
(Smicrornis brevirostris) was very active amongst the leaves of 
the box-trees, searching for minor forms of life, clinging head 
downwards to the terminal branchlets, or hovering in front of 
them. Very little escaped it, and it was always on the move. 
Leaving camp we still followed up along the Paroo on a good 
road. The vegetation became more varied as we proceeded north 
