118 WOESTENHOEME, Some Jervis Bay Birds [™? ET 
Here in a small Turpentine tree (Syncarpia laurifolia) a 
nearly-completed nest was found resting securely in. a triple fork 
less than fifteen feet from the ground. One bird — the female, 
presumably — was gathering bark from the soft-barked eucalypts 
round*about, the other bird being always near her. She would 
fly, with large pieces of bark in her bill, at great speed direct to 
the nest; the male bird following so closely behind that his beak 
seemed sometimes to touch her tail. He would take up a position 
close to the nest, nearly always in the same place, and, while she 
was busy arranging the material, he would sound the pretty tink¬ 
ling notes of the species. This call consisted of series of three 
notes at a time — a single note followed by another repeated so 
quickly that it might be called a double note. This double note 
was several intervals lower in tone, the drop being, in musical 
terms, from the upper tonic to the mediant. The first note was 
like the single “tink” of the Bell-Miner (Manorhina melano- 
phrys), but softer and less explosive. The plumage when seen 
closely in life is a wonderful combination of black and light 
yellow in shining hues. If the bird flies above one, the bright 
primrose yellow of the wing-quills and of the large tail (often 
spread during short flights) at once catches the eye, and is 
in marked contrast with the rich black of the head and neck. 
The light-tinted “fleshy excrescence” round the eye gave the 
bird, for some time, the ill-sounding but now happily abandoned 
name of “Warty-faced Honeyeater. ,, Originally the bird had been 
called the “Black and Yellow Bee-eater” (Merops phrygius 
Latham) ; another name was the “Mock Regent Bird.” 
Two more nests were near by, about twelve feet up, in stringy - 
bark trees. These probably contained eggs, as the birds were 
in attendance; but I was not able to climb and look for the rich 
dark-coloured eggs. All the nests had a similar situation in 
the tree that a Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria australis ) might have 
chosen for its nest. They were open, cup-shaped structures of 
brown bark, and were larger than the nest of the Yellow Robin, 
though not as large or untidy on the outside as that of the Grey 
Thrush (C olluricincla harmonica ). 
Other species, too, were breeding here. A male White¬ 
shouldered Triller or Caterpillar-eater (Lalage tricolor) was sit¬ 
ting calmly on its compact little nest on the other side of the 
Turpentine tree in which the Regent Honeyeater’s nest was 
situated. This Caterpillar-eater, it may here be remarked, has 
been exceptionally plentiful this season about Sydney. The 
bright canary-like singing of the male birds has been heard con¬ 
tinuously during the breeding season, not only in the bush, but 
in the parks and private gardens of the outer suburbs. In an 
adjoining tree—a hmcalypt — about twenty feet away from the 
Turpentine tree, a pair of Leaden Flycatchers (Myiagra 
rubecula) were taking turns sitting on their dainty lichen-decor¬ 
ated nest fixed on a broken dead bough. It was a Robin-like 
nest, and very hard to see even with the bird on it, with the bill 
