Part 6

It was very numerous in the town of Perth until about the middle of April, when I missed it suddenly, nor did I observe it again until near the end of May, when I saw it in countless numbers flying in company with the Common Swallows and Martens over a lake about ten miles north of the town; so numerous, in fact, were they, that they darkened the water as they flew over it.

Its voice greatly resembles that of the Common Swallow in character, but is much more harsh.

The stomach is muscular and capacious, and the food consists of insects generally.

The season of incubation is from September to December. The situation of the nest is much varied; I have seen one placed in a thickly foliaged bough near the ground, while others were in a naked fork, on the side of the hole of a tree, in a niche formed by a portion of the bark having been separated from the trunk, &c. The nest is rather shallow, of a rounded form, about five inches in diameter, and composed of fine twigs neatly lined with fibrous roots. I observed that the nests found in Van Diemen’s Land were larger, more compact and more neatly formed than those on the continent of Australia; and one which was shown me by Mr. Justice Montague on his picturesque estate at Kangaroo Point, near Hobart Town, was placed at the extremity of a small leafy branch, as represented in the Plate.

The eggs are generally four in number; they differ much in the disposition of their markings; their ground-colour is dull white, spotted and dashed with dark umber-brown; in some a second series of greyish spots appear as if beneath the surface of the shell; their medium length is eleven lines, and breadth eight lines.

Head, neck, and the whole of the body fuliginous grey; wings dark bluish black, the external edges of the second, third and fourth primaries white; tail bluish black, all the feathers except the two middle ones largely tipped with white; irides dark brown; bill blue with a black tip; feet mealy lead-colour.

The sexes are alike in the colouring of their plumage, and are only to be distinguished by the female being somewhat smaller in size.

The young have an irregular stripe of dirty white down the centre of each feather of the upper surface, and are mottled with the same on the under surface.

The Plate represents a male and female of the natural size.

ARTAMUS MINOR, _Vieill._ Little Wood Swallow.

_Artamus minor_, Vieill. Nouv. Dict. d’Hist. Nat., tom. xvii. p. 298.—Ib. Ency. Méth., Part II. p. 759.

_Ocypterus fuscatus_, Valenc. Mém. du Mus. d’Hist. Nat., tom. vi. p. 24. t. 9. fig. 1.

_Leptopteryx minor_, Wagl. Syst. Av., sp. 6.

_Ocypterus minor_, Gould, Syn. Birds of Australia, Part I. fig. 1.

In its structure and in the disposition of the markings of its plumage, this species offers a greater resemblance to the _Artamus sordidus_ than to any other member of the group; the habits of the two species are also very similar; if any difference exists, it is that the present bird is still more aërial, a circumstance indicated by the more feeble form of the foot, and the equal, if not greater, development of the wing. During fine weather, and even in the hottest part of the day, it floats about in the air in the most easy and graceful manner, performing in the course of its evolutions many beautiful curves and circles, without the least apparent motion of the wings, whose silvery whiteness as seen from beneath, together with the snowy tips of its wide-spread tail, offer a strong contrast to the dark colouring of the other parts of its plumage.

I found it abundant on the Lower Namoi, particularly on the plains thinly studded with the _Acacia pendula_ and other low trees in the neighbourhood of Gummel-Gummel, where it had evidently been breeding, as I observed numerous young ones, whose primaries were not sufficiently developed to admit of their performing a migration of any distance; besides which, they were constantly being fed by the parents, who were hawking about in the air over and around the trees, while the young were quietly perched on some dead twig, as represented in the accompanying Plate, where two adults and three young are figured, in the manner in which they are seen huddled together in a state of nature.

I have not yet heard of this species having been seen within the prescribed limits of the colony of New South Wales, neither is it a native of Southern or Western Australia.

I have received two specimens from Port Essington, and I believe the examples in the Paris Museum were from Timor, which proves that it has a wide range northwards of the Namoi; and I shall not be surprised if future research should ascertain it to be very generally distributed over the interior of the Australian continent, not as a summer visitant only, but as a permanent resident.

The sexes are alike in plumage, but the young differ considerably, as shown in the Plate, a reference to which will give a more correct idea of their appearance and markings than any description.

The whole of the head, back, and abdomen chocolate-brown; wings, rump, and under tail-coverts bluish black; tail deep bluish black, all the feathers except the two outer and two middle ones tipped with white; bill beautiful violet-blue at the base, darker at the tip; irides and feet nearly black.

The figures are of the natural size.

ARTAMUS CINEREUS, _Vieill._ Grey-breasted Wood Swallow.

_Artamus cinereus_, Vieill. Nouv. Dict. d’Hist. Nat., tom. xvii. p. 297.—Ib. Ency. Méth., Part II. p. 758.—Vig. and Horsf. in Linn. Trans., vol. xv. p. 211.

_Ocypterus cinereus_, Valanc. Mém. du Mus. d’Hist. Nat., tom. vi. p. 22. t. 9. fig. 1.

_Be-wö-wen_, Aborigines of the lowland and mountain districts of Western Australia.

_Wood Swallow_ of the colonists of ditto.

This bird exceeds in size all other of the Australian Wood Swallows, and as far as I am aware (not having seen the species from Madagascar, figured in the “Planches Enluminées,”) is the largest of the genus. Its large tail, most of the feathers of which are broadly tipped with white, as well as the colouring of its plumage, at once point out its close affinity to the _Artamus sordidus_ and _Artamus minor_. Like them it possesses a very extensive range of habitat, Mr. Robert Brown having found it at Broad Sound on the east, and Mr. Gilbert on the west coast; it is also a native of Timor.

In Western Australia, although a very local, it is by no means an uncommon species, particularly at Swan River, where it inhabits the limestone hills near the coast, and the “Clear Hills” of the interior, assembling in small families, and feeding upon the seeds of the _Xanthorrhœa_ which proves that insects do not form the sole diet of this species; with such avidity in fact does it devour the ripe seeds of this grass-tree, that several birds may frequently be seen crowded together on the perpendicular seed-stalks of this plant busily engaged in extracting them; at other times, particularly among the limestone hills, where there are but few trees, it descends to the broken rocky ground in search of insects and their larvæ.

It breeds in October and November, making a round compact nest, in some instances of fibrous roots, lined with fine hair-like grasses, in others of the stems of grasses and small plants; it is built either in a scrubby bush or among the grass-like leaves of the _Xanthorrhœa_, and is deeper and more cup-shaped than those of the other members of the group. The eggs are subject to considerable variation in colour and in the character of their markings; they are usually bluish white, spotted and blotched with lively reddish brown, intermingled with obscure spots and dashes of purplish grey; all the markings being most numerous towards the larger end; they are about eleven lines long by eight lines broad.

The sexes are alike in colour, and can only be distinguished from each other with certainty by dissection. I have remarked that specimens from Timor rather exceed in size those collected on the Australian continent, and are somewhat lighter in colour; but these variations are too slight to be regarded as specific.

Crown of the head, neck, throat and chest grey, passing into sooty grey on the abdomen; space between the bill and the eye, the forepart of the cheek, the chin, the upper and under tail-coverts jet-black; two middle tail-feathers black; the remainder black, largely tipped with white, with the exception of the outer feather on each side, in which the black colouring extends on the outer web nearly to the tip; wings deep grey; primaries bluish grey; under surface of the shoulder white, passing into grey on the under side of the primaries; irides dark blackish brown; bill light greyish blue at the base, black at the tip; legs and feet greenish grey.

The figures are those of a male and a female of the natural size.

ARTAMUS ALBIVENTRIS, _Gould_. White-vented Wood Swallow.

_Artamus albiventris_, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., March 23, 1847.

Two examples of this species are all that have come under my notice; one of these was killed on the Darling Downs in New South Wales, and the other some distance to the northward of that locality, it being one of the birds procured during Dr. Leichardt’s expedition to Port Essington. Its nearest ally is the _Artamus cinereus_, a species inhabiting the opposite side of the continent; but it is somewhat smaller, and may moreover be distinguished from that bird by the white under tail-coverts, and the lighter colour of the lower part of the abdomen. I regret that I have no information to communicate respecting its habits and economy; they are doubtless very similar to those of its representative above alluded to.

Lores, space beneath the eye and the chin deep black; head, neck and upper part of the back brownish grey; lower part of the back and the wings dark grey, becoming gradually deeper towards the tips of the feathers; primaries and secondaries narrowly edged with white at the tip; under surface of the wing white; ear-coverts, chest and abdomen pale grey, passing into white on the under tail-coverts; upper tail-coverts and tail black; the apical third of all but the two middle ones white; irides dark brown; bill yellowish horn-colour, becoming black at the tip; feet blackish brown.

The figures are of the natural size.

ARTAMUS PERSONATUS, _Gould_. Masked Wood Swallow.

_Ocypterus personatus_, Gould, in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part VIII. p. 149.

_Jil̈-bung_, Aborigines of the mountain districts of Western Australia.

I have much pleasure in adding this new and highly interesting species of _Artamus_ to the Wood Swallows of Australia, a country peculiarly adapted for this tribe of birds, and of which the fauna comprises a greater number of species of this group than that of any other. My knowledge of the range of this species is very limited; a single specimen was sent me from South Australia, while the fine examples from which my figures were taken were killed by Mr. Gilbert in the colony of Swan River. Its richly coloured black face and throat, separated from the delicate grey of the breast by a narrow line of snowy white, at once distinguishes it from every other species, while the strong contrast of these colours renders it a conspicuous object among the trees.

In size and structure it more nearly resembles the _Artamus superciliosus_ than any other, and the two species form beautiful analogues of each other, one being in all probability confined to the eastern portion of the country, and the other to the western.

“I have only met,” says Mr. Gilbert, “with this species in the York and Zoodyay districts. It is very like _Artamus sordidus_ in its habits, but is more shy and retired, never being seen but in the most secluded parts of the bush. It is merely a summer visitant here, generally making its appearance in the latter part of October, and immediately commencing the task of incubation. Its voice very much resembles the chirping of the English Sparrow.

“Its nest is placed in the upright fork of a dead tree, or in the hollow part of the stump of a grass-tree; it is neither so well nor so neatly formed as those of the other species of the group, being a frail structure externally composed of a very few extremely small twigs, above which is a layer of fine dried grasses. The eggs also differ as remarkably as the nest, their ground colour being light greenish grey, dashed and speckled with hair-brown principally at the larger end, and slightly spotted with grey, appearing as if beneath the surface of the shell; they are ten and a half lines long by eight and a half lines broad. I found two nests in a York Gum Forest, about five miles to the east of the Avon River: each of these contained two eggs, which I believe is the usual number.

“Its food consists of insects generally and their larvæ.”

The male has the face, ear-coverts and throat jet-black, bounded below with a narrow line of white; crown of the head sooty black, gradually passing into the deep grey, which covers the whole of the upper surface, wings and tail; the latter tipped with white; all the under surface very delicate grey; thighs dark grey; irides blackish brown; bill blue at the base, becoming black at the tip; legs and feet mealy bluish grey.

The female differs in having the colouring of the bill and the black mask on the face much paler.

The figures are those of a male and a female of the natural size.

ARTAMUS SUPERCILIOSUS, _Gould_. White Eye-browed Wood Swallow.

_Ocypterus superciliosus_, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part IV. 1836, p. 142; and in Syn. Birds of Australia, Part I. fig. 2.

There is no species of _Artamus_ yet discovered to which the present yields the palm, either for elegance of form or for the beauty and variety of its plumage; the only known species with which it could be confounded is the _Artamus rufiventer_, an Indian bird with the breast similarly marked, but which is entirely destitute of the superciliary stripe of white, which has suggested the specific name; in this character and in the rich chestnut colouring of the breast, it differs from every member of its tribe inhabiting Australia. I am unable to say what is the extent of its range, but I am induced to believe that it is confined to Australia, and that in all probability it seldom leaves the interior of the country; the extreme limits of the colony of New South Wales, particularly those which border the extensive plains, being the only parts where it has yet been observed. I first met with it at Yarrundi on the Dartbrook, a tributary of the Hunter, where it was thinly dispersed among the trees growing on the stony ridges bordering the flats.

From this locality to as far as I penetrated northwards on the Namoi, as well as in the direction of the River Peel, it was distributed in similar numbers, intermingled with the _Artamus sordidus_, at about the ratio of one hundred pairs to the square mile, the two species appearing to live and perform the task of incubation in perfect harmony, both being frequently observed on the same tree. In their dispositions, however, and in many of their actions they are somewhat dissimilar; the bird forming the subject of the present Plate being much more shy and difficult of approach than the _Artamus sordidus_, which is at all times very tame; it also gives a preference to the topmost branches of the highest trees, from which it sallies forth for the capture of insects, and to which it again returns, in the usual manner of the tribe. In every part where I have observed it, it is strictly migratory, arriving in summer, and departing northwards after the breeding-season.

The nest is ever most difficult of detection, being generally placed either in a fork of the branches or in a niche near the bole of the tree, whence the bark had been partially stripped. It is a round, very shallow and frail structure, composed of small twigs and lined with fibrous roots; those I discovered contained two eggs, but I had not sufficient opportunities for ascertaining if this number was constant. Their ground-colour is dull buffy white, spotted with umber-brown, forming a zone near the larger end; in some these spots are sparingly sprinkled over the whole surface; they have also the obscure grey spotting like those of _A. sordidus_; the eggs are rather more than eleven lines long by eight and a half lines broad.

The male has the lores, space surrounding the eye, and the ear-coverts deep black; chin greyish black passing into blackish grey on the chest; crown of the head greyish black; over each eye a pure white stripe commencing in a point, and gradually becoming wider or spatulate in form as it proceeds towards the occiput; all the upper surface, wings and tail fuliginous grey, which is lightest on the rump and tail; all the tail-feathers tipped with white, except the outer web of the lateral feather, which is grey; under surface of the wing pure white; all the under surface rich deep chestnut; irides nearly black; bill light blue at the base, black at the tip; feet dark lead-colour.

The female has a similar distribution of colouring, but differs from her mate in the following particulars: lores and a ring surrounding the eye jet-black; only an indication of the superciliary stripe; throat grey; tail not so distinctly tipped with white; under surface light chestnut-red.

The figures are those of a male and a female of the natural size.

ARTAMUS LEUCOPYGIALIS, _Gould_. White-rumped Wood Swallow.

_Artamus leucopygialis_, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., February 8, 1842.

On a careful comparison of specimens of the White-rumped _Artami_ from India and the Indian Archipelago with those killed in Australia, I cannot but consider that at least two, if not three, species have been confounded under one name, and that the Australian bird had remained undescribed until characterized by me at the Meeting of the Zoological Society above quoted. The present species is most nearly allied to the _Artamus leucorhynchus_, but is readily distinguished from it by the blue colour of the bill; and I may here remark, that all the Australian birds have the bill fine pale blue, and are also considerably smaller in all their admeasurements than those of the islands to the northwards.

Van Diemen’s Land and Western Australia are the only colonies in which this bird has not been observed; its range, therefore, over the continent may be considered as very general: in South Australia and New South Wales it would appear to be migratory, visiting those parts in summer for the purpose of breeding. Among other places where I observed it in considerable abundance was Mosquito, and the other small islands near the mouth of the Hunter, and on the borders of the rivers Mokai and Namoi, situated to the northward of Liverpool Plains; in these last-mentioned localities it was breeding among the large flooded gum-trees bordering the rivers.

The breeding-season commences in September and continues until January, during which period at least two broods are reared. In the Christmas week of 1839, at which time I was on the plains of the interior, in the direction of the Namoi, the young progeny of the second brood were perched in pairs or threes together, on a dead twig near their nest, as represented in the Plate. They were constantly visited and fed by the adults, who were hawking about for insects in great numbers, some performing their evolutions above the tops and among the branches of the trees, while others were sweeping over the open plain with great rapidity of flight, making in their progress through the air the most rapid and abrupt turns; at one moment rising to a considerable altitude and the next descending to within a few feet of the ground, as the insects of which they were in pursuit arrested their attention. In the brushes, on the contrary, the flight of this bird is more soaring and of a much shorter duration, particularly when hawking in the open glades, which frequently teem with insect life. When flying near the ground the white mark on the rump shows very conspicuously, and strikingly reminds one of the House Marten of our own country.

Two nests, taken in November on a small island in Coral Bay, near the entrance of the harbour at Port Essington, were compactly formed of dried wiry grass and the fine plants growing on the beach; they were placed in a fork of a slender mangrove-tree within fifteen feet of the water, in which they were growing; but like several other Australian birds, the _Artamus leucopygialis_ often avails itself of the deserted nests of other species instead of building one of its own. Most of those I found breeding on the Mokai had possessed themselves of the forsaken nest of the _Grallina Melanoleuca_, which they had rendered warm and of the proper size by slightly lining it with grasses, fibrous roots, and the narrow leaves of the _Eucalypti_. The eggs are generally three in number, are much lighter in colour, and more minutely spotted than those of any other species of the genus I have seen; their ground-colour is flesh-white, finely freckled and spotted with faint markings of reddish brown and grey, in some instances forming a zone at the larger end: their medium length is ten lines, and breadth seven lines and a half.

The sexes are only to be distinguished by dissection, and may be described thus: head, throat and back sooty grey; primaries and tail brownish black washed with grey; chest, all the under surface and rump pure white; irides brown; bill light bluish grey at the base, black at the tip; legs and feet mealy greenish grey.

The Plate represents a male, a female, two young ones and a nest of the natural size.

DICÆUM HIRUNDINACEUM. Swallow Dicæum.

_Sylvia hirundinacea_, Shaw, Nat. Misc., vol. iv. pl. 114.—Lath. Ind. Orn. Supp., p. lv.

_Swallow Warbler_, Lath. Gen. Syn. Supp., vol. ii. p. 250.—Shaw, Gen. Zool., vol. x. p. 613.

_Pipra Desmaretii_, Leach, Zool. Misc., vol. i. p. 94. pl. 41.

_Crimson-throated Honey-sucker_, Lewin, Birds of New Holl., pl. 7.

_Desmaretian Manakin_, Shaw, Gen. Zool., vol. x. p. 18.—Lath. Gen. Hist., vol. vii. p. 240.

_Dicæum atrogaster_, Less. Traité d’Orn., p. 303.

_Moo-ne-jë-tang_, Aborigines of the lowland districts of Western Australia.

By far the greater number of the colonists of Australia are, I am sure, totally unacquainted with this beautiful little bird, yet there is scarcely an estate in either of the colonies in which it may not be found as a permanent resident or an occasional visitor: a closer examination of the birds, and other natural objects with which we are most nearly surrounded, would at all times repay with interest the trouble of their investigation.