CINCLORAMPHUS RUFESCENS.
Rufous-tinted Cincloramphus.
Anthus ru/escens, Yig. and Horsf. in Linn. Trans., yol. xv. p. 230.
E-rolt-del, Aborigines of the Mountain districts of Western Australia.
Singing Lark of the Colonists.
I f Australia be not celebrated for its singing-birds, it has still some few whose voices serve to enliven the
monotony of its scenery; and of these no one deserves greater attention than the bird here represented,
which is a very sweet songster, and whose note somewhat resembles, but is much inferior to that o f our own
Skylark. With the exception o f Van Diemen’s Land, where I believe it is never seen, it appears to be
distributed over all parts o f Australia, as evidenced by my collection, containing specimens from every
locality yet visited by Europeans. In New South Wales and Western Australia it is strictly migratory, and
only a summer visitor, arriving in August and departing in F ebruary; on the other hand, I met with it on
the sand hills a t Holdfast Bay in South Australia in the month o f July, the period o f winter: although
not exclusively a terrestrial bird, it spends much of its time on the ground, from which it makes perpendicular
ascents to a great height in the air, and then descending to the tops o f the highest trees, flies,
horizontally from one tree to another, singing all the time with the greatest volubility ; the female, which is
not more than half the size o f the male, remaining all the while on the ground, from which she is not easily
aroused, and consequently not so often seen. I t evinces a great partiality to open grassy plains here and
there studded with trees. I t breeds in October, November and December, and sometimes rears two
broods during the season. The nest is placed in a depression o f the earth, most frequently a t the foot
o f a slightly raised tuft o f grass, and is externally composed o f strong grasses and lined with very fine
grasses, and sometimes with hairs. The eggs are four in number, ten lines long by seven and a half lines
broad, and are o f a purplish white, very boldly marked with freckles and small blotches of deep chestnut-
brown, so much so as frequently to render the blotches more conspicuous than the ground colour.
The female frequently utters a monotonous shriek o r call a t night.
T h e male has all the upper surface dark brown, each feather margined with olive-brown ; upper tail-
coverts rufous; lores b lack ; stripe above the eye and throat whitish; all the under surface pale brownish
grey, deepening into buff on the under tail-coverts, and with a series o f minute spots o f brown on the
b rea st; irides hazel; bill dark lead-colour in summer, fleshy brown in winter; tarsi yellowish g rey ; feet
bluish ashy grey.
The female is smaller and is destitute of the black lores ; in other respects she is so like the male th at a
separate description is unnecessary.
The figures represent the two sexes of the natural size, on a branch of the cherry-tree of the colonists
(Exocarpus Cupressiformis').