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Show 1875.] BIRDS FROM QUEENSLAND. 595 the honey and insects. In the neighbourhood of Sydney they frequent the orange-groves, and occasionally breed among the branches during the months of October and November. Their cry is peculiar, but not unpleasant, and at times varied. 126. PTILOTIS LEWINII. This species is universally dispersed over the whole of the coast-country from the Hunter river to Cooktown. It is particularly fond of extracting honey from the flowers of the plantains and native bananas (Musa banksii, Miiller). Banana groves abound in the Cardwell district, and may be distinguished at a great distance in large patches clothing the sides of the mountains on the sea-coast; and here this species is one of the most common birds. The nest is like that of P. chrysops, cup-shaped, open at the top, slung by the sides or rim between the twigs of some leafy bough or vine; it is composed of shreds of bark and grasses, webs of spiders, &c, and lined with similar material of a finer texture, or occasionally, when found in the neighbourhood of dwellings, with feathers, wool, or other soft substances. The eggs are two in number, pearly white, with deep-reddish dots. 127. PTILOTIS VERSICOLOR. I only met with one specimen of this bird, which I obtained from Broadbent, who informed me the species was not scarce and usually fed among the blossoms of tall Eucalypti. 128. PTILOTIS MACLEAYANA, Ramsay, P. L. S. of N. S. W. pt. i. p. 10 (1875). This fine species is one I mentioned in the P. Z. S. 1868, p. 386, under the name of Ptilotis versicolor of Gould (Handb. B. Austr. i. p. 506); and, strange to say, even the fully adult birds show that peculiarity in the plumage which is usually characteristic of immaturity. At first I considered them all young P. versicolor ; but after having obtained and examined, from several sources, extending over a period of six years, numerous fine specimens, all in similar plumage, and shot at various times through the year, I felt convinced that they belonged to a distinct species ; and on comparing them with Mr. Gould's excellent plates, I have no doubt I am correct. The species has not a very extensive range, being confined, as far as we yet know, to the coast-range from the Herbert river north to Cooktown on the Endeavour. I found them nowhere plentiful, and always of a shy and retiring disposition. The sexes are alike in plumage. The only note I heard them utter is a simple feeble cry resembling that of P. chrysops, but not so loud; in their actions and retiring disposition they resmble more P. leivinii. 129. PTILOTIS FASCIOGULARIS. I find no mention in m y note-book of meeting with this bird at Rockingham Bay ; but I found it plentiful on an island off Tort |