_J. Gould and H. C. Richter del et lith._ _C. Hullmandel Imp._
]
MELIPHAGA NOVÆ-HOLLANDIÆ, _Vig. & Horsf._
New Holland Honey-eater.
_Certhia Novæ-Hollandiæ_, Lath. Ind. Orn., p. 296.—Turton’s Edit. of
Linn. Syst. Nat., vol. i. p. 292.
_New Holland Creeper_, White’s Journ., pl. in p. 186.—Lath. Gen.
Hist., vol. iv. p. 171.—Shaw’s Gen. Zool., vol. viii. p.
225.
_L’Héorotaire tacheté_, Vieill. Ois. dor., tom. ii. p. 91. pl. 57.
_Meliphaga Novæ-Hollandiæ_, Vig. and Horsf. in Linn. Trans., vol. xv.
p. 311.
_Melitreptus Novæ-Hollandiæ_, Vieill. 2nde Edit. du Nouv. Dict.
d’Hist. Nat., tom. xiv. p. 328; and Ency. Méth. Orn., Part
II. p. 606.
_Meliphaga Balgonera_, Steph. Cont. of Shaw’s Gen. Zool., vol. xiv. p.
261.
_Meliphaga barbata_, Swains. Class. of Birds, vol. ii. p. 326.
_Meliornis Novæ-Hollandiæ_, G. R. Gray, List of Gen. of Birds, 2nd
Edit., p. 19.
I quite agree with Messrs. Vigors and Horsfield in making the bird
forming the subject of the present Plate the type of the restricted
genus _Meliphaga_. Independently of its claim to this distinction from
the circumstance of its being the oldest known, it is the species to
which the generic term is especially applicable, since, I conceive, it
feeds less upon insects and more upon nectarine juices than any other of
the family.
The _Meliphaga Novæ-Hollandiæ_ is one of the most abundant and familiar
birds inhabiting the colonies of New South Wales, Van Diemen’s Land, and
South Australia: all the gardens of the settlers are visited by it, and
among their shrubs and flowering plants it annually breeds. It is not a
migratory species, but occasionally deserts some districts for others
whose flowering plants offer it a more tempting _locale_, and furnish it
with a more abundant supply of food: the belts of Banksias, growing on
sterile, sandy soils, afford it so congenial an asylum, that I am
certainly not wrong in stating that they are never deserted by it, or
that the one is a certain accompaniment of the other. The range enjoyed
by this species appears to be confined to the south-eastern portions of
Australia: it is abundant on the sandy districts of South Australia
wherever the Banksias abound; but to the westward of this part of the
country I have not traced it. At the Swan, and the other parts of the
western coast, it certainly is never found. In Van Diemen’s Land it is
much more numerous on the northern than on the southern portion of the
island; it is also most abundantly dispersed over all the islands in
Bass’s Straits, whose sandy, sterile soil favours the growth of the
Banksias; it is equally common over every part of the colony of New
South Wales, which may, in fact, be regarded as the great stronghold of
the species; at the same time I must not fail to observe, that the
districts bordering the sea-coast are most favourable to the growth of
its favourite tree; hence while it is there most numerous, in the
interior of the country it is seldom to be seen. It evinces a more
decided preference for shrubs and low trees than for those of a larger
growth; consequently it is a species particularly subject to the notice
of man while it flits from bush to bush. Nor is it the least attractive
of the Australian Fauna; the strikingly-contrasted markings of its
plumage, and the beautiful appearance of its golden-edged wings, when
passing with its quick, devious and jumping flight from shrub to shrub,
rendering it a conspicuous and pleasing object.
It has a loud, shrill, liquid, although monotonous note. Its food, which
consists of the pollen and juices of flowers, is procured while clinging
and creeping among them in every variety of position: it also feeds on
fruits and insects.
It usually rears two or three broods during the course of the season,
which lasts from August to January: the nest is very easily found, being
placed, in the forest, in any low open bush, and in the gardens among
the shrubs and flowers: one of the nests in my collection was taken from
a row of peas in the kitchen-garden of the Government House at Sydney.
It is usually placed at about eighteen inches or two feet from the
ground, and is a somewhat compact structure, composed of small wiry
sticks, coarse grasses, and broad and narrow strips of bark; the inside
is lined with the soft woolly portion of the blossoms of small ground
plants: it usually lays two, but occasionally three eggs, which are of a
pale buff, thinly spotted and freckled with deep chestnut-brown,
particularly at the larger end, where they not unfrequently assume the
form of a zone; their medium length is nine lines and a half, and
breadth nearly seven lines.