Page:The Emu volume 2.djvu/233

 A. pusilla in this respect, but may be easily separated from both these birds by the great size of its bill.

Four specimens (two being young) of the new species were collected by Mr. A. G. Campbell on King Island last November. For further remarks see his article, "The Birds of King Island," in this issue, page 207.

He has also brought under my notice another Tit, of which unfortunately he was only able to procure a single specimen—an adult, however. It differs from the three species of Tits before-mentioned by its more slender tarsi and wings, but conspicuously by the absence of the light crescent-shaped marks on the brownish (rufous-brown) feathers of the forehead, and by the white feathers of the cheeks, chest, &c., having the centre only black, and not also edged with that colour as in the other species. Length, 4.0; culmen, .3; wing, 2.1; tail, 1.6; tarsus, .85. By this diagnosis I strongly suspect the stranger to be a re-discovery of Gould's long-lost Acanthiza ewingii ("Birds of Australia," vol. iii., pi. 55). If not, and pending the receipt of more material, I venture to provisionally name the bird A. rufifrons, or the King Island Tit.

Island, lying at the western end of Bass Strait, which separates Tasmania from the mainland of Australia, has always been of great interest to the biologist. A study of its lifeforms has materially assisted in proving that the island State at no very remote period was of much greater area than it is at present, and, further, was actually connected with the mainland before the mighty forces of the ocean succeeded in opening up a strait along some weak spot. King Island is in area about 272,000 acres, 40 miles long by 16 miles at its widest part. Though only 50 miles separate the north point from Cape Otway on the mainland, and a similar distance the south point from the northwest of Tasmania, yet to the south are found several islands and rocks, and the straits between are very shallow, pointing to the fact that King Island was attached to Tasmania at a later period than to the mainland. In fact, the strait on the north undoubtedly marks the spot where the sea first broke in and commenced its work of severing Tasmania from Australia, for on the eastern side of Bass Strait, between Wilson Promontory and the north-east point of Tasmania, the continuous chain of islets, all built of a similar granitoid rock, proves that there a land bridge existed at a more recent date, when some of the higher animals were in existence.

The presence of the Emu and kangaroo in Tasmania can