Part 18

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

AMYTIS STRIATUS: Gould.

J. & E. Gould del^t. C. Hullmandel Imp. ]

AMYTIS STRIATUS. Striated Wren.

Amytis textilis, Less. Traité d’Orn., p. 454. pl. 67. fig. 2.

Dasyornis striatus, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part VII. p. 143.

The only specimen I procured of this little bird in a recent state, was shot while I was traversing the Lower Namoi; it appeared to give preference to a loose sandy soil studded with high rank grass, which, growing in tufts, left the interspaces quite bare: through the natural labyrinth thus formed the Striated Wren ran with amazing rapidity, and it was only by forcing it to take wing that I succeeded in killing the one I obtained, which on dissection proved to be a male, and which served for the upper figure in my Plate: the other figure is supposed to represent the female; but as this can only be ascertained by the internal examination of a recent specimen, and no opportunity for so doing has yet occurred, this point must, for the present, remain undecided. All the specimens I have seen from New South Wales were in the red state of plumage, which goes far towards proving that this bird is really distinct from Amytis textilis.

Nothing has yet been ascertained respecting its nidification: its food, like that of the Textile Wren, consists of insects of various kinds.

Upper surface fine rusty red, each feather with a line of buffy white bounded on each side by black down the centre; line beneath the eye black; ear-coverts black, striated with white; wings and tail brown, margined with light reddish brown; base of the primaries rust-red, forming a conspicuous patch; chin and throat white; feathers of the chest buffy white, with two lines of brown, one down each side the stem; under surface rust-red, some of the feathers with a stripe of white down the centre; tail dark brown, indistinctly barred with a still darker tint, margined with lighter brown; irides hazel; bill dark horn-colour; feet brownish lead-colour.

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

AMYTIS MACROURUS: Gould.

J. Gould and H. C. Richter del et lith. Hullmandel & Walton Imp. ]

AMYTIS MACROURUS, Gould. Large-tailed Wren.

Amytis macrourus, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Jan. 27, 1847.

Nyern-de and Jee-ra, Aborigines of the interior of Western Australia.

The present is the first species of the genus that has been discovered in Western Australia; the two examples in my own collection are all that I have yet seen; these were shot in the interior by Mr. Gilbert, who states that “it inhabits the thickets, and is almost always on the ground in families of from four to seven in number: it carries its tail more erect than any other bird I have seen, and certainly no bird runs or rather hops over the surface of the ground with greater rapidity.”

It is evidently the representative of the Amytis textilis of the eastern coast, to which it is very nearly allied, but from which, as well as from the A. striatus, it may at once be distinguished by its more robust form, and by the much greater length and size of its tail.

All the upper surface brown, each feather with a narrow stripe of white down the centre; under surface the same, but much paler; under surface of the shoulder pale rusty red; tail brown, margined with pale brown; irides hazel; base of the lower mandible horn-colour, remainder of the bill black; feet flesh-brown.

The figures are of the natural size.

STIPITURUS MALACHURUS: Lefs.

J. & E. Gould del^t. C. Hullmandel Imp. ]

STIPITURUS MALACHURUS, Less. Emu Wren.

Muscicapa malachura, Lath. Ind. Orn. Supp., pl. lii.—Shaw, Gen. Zool., vol. x. p. 407.

Soft-tailed Flycatcher, Linn. Trans., vol. iv. p. 242. pl. 21.—Lath. Gen. Syn. Supp., vol. ii. p. 224.

Malurus malachurus, Vig. & Horsf. in Linn. Trans., vol. xv. p. 224.

Stipiturus malachurus, Less. Traité d’Orn., p. 415.

Soft-tailed Warbler, Lath. Gen. Hist., vol. vii. p. 123.

Waw-gul-jelly, Aborigines of New South Wales.