AMYTIS MACROURUS, Gow.
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.

 

Tue 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 4. sérvatus, 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.