Order XXI. (continued)
Family 132—Wood-Shrikes—contains two of the best known of Australian birds, for they are to be found about almost every town and city, as well as in the country. The well-known Magpie-Lark has but one close cousin in the world, a New Guinea bird. Its mud nest is familiar to country boys. It is notable that, excepting Swallows, only two other Australian birds build a mud nest. These birds, the Apostle-Bird and the White-winged Chough, are mentioned later. Its dainty, well-kept plumage renders the Magpie-Lark one of the most graceful of birds. Its flight is "unlike that of any bird known to me." (Gould.) "It flies in a straight line, with a heavy, flapping motion of the wings." Its loud call is responsible for the name of Pee-wee, a common name for a European Plover; its black and white coloring for the vernacular name—Magpie-Lark.
This bird is of great value, as it consumes large quantities of pond snails, the necessary host of the early stages of the liver fluke. Exterminate the pond snails, and immediately the liver fluke is completely destroyed, and all future loss from its ravages is saved to the pastoralists. In 1846, fluke caused a loss of £10,000,000 in England alone, so it is a serious pest, and may yet prove a very expensive one to Australia.
This bird's scientific position is disputed. It has been classed with Crows and with Thrushes. Gould placed it by itself. Dr. Sharpe has, however, placed it in the family Prionopidae. Its vocal organs are anomalous, and it may be that its position is not finally settled yet.
Placed by Sharpe in the same family are the Shrike-Thrushes, strictly Australian birds. The glorious "powerful swelling notes" of our common bird caused Latham to bestow the well-deserved name harmonica on it. Yet there are some who talk of Australia as a land of songless birds. This falsehood seems to have had its origin in a note written by Caley, who, about 1825, collected near Sydney, for the Linnean Society of London. As quoted by North, he said, "They (Superb-Warblers) are good songsters, and, I may say, almost the only ones in the colony." Fortunately, the Harmonious Shrike-Thrush is becoming common and tame about school grounds and most towns. It is occasionally to be heard in the Melbourne Botanic Gardens.
Family 134 contains the famous Shrikes, those birds which are said to keep a butcher's shop. Not being "birds of prey," they do not hold their prey in their feet, so they fasten it in the fork of a tree, or on a thorn. Then they proceed to eat it, or leave it until they are hungry. Our Shrike or Butcher-Bird has the same habit.
The Australian Butcher-Bird has a rich, mellow, flute-like note, which is more frequently heard in autumn. Some consider his one of the best of bird-notes. His strongly-hooked bill renders him a terror to small birds, including caged Canaries.
That glorious songster, the Australian Magpie, is placed in this family. These Australian songsters are now divided into five closely-similar species, all possessing the same rich carol. The Tasmanian bird was formerly called the "Organ-Bird." This Australian musician is responsible for the European epigram of "white Crows that sing." These birds are not Crows, nor are they white, but they sing, so that Alfred Russel Wallace has declared that no European songbird can equal them. Gould found it impossible to describe their "carol," and regretted that "his readers could not," as he had done, "listen to the birds in their native wilds." Their early morning carol lives in the memory. The Australian Magpie is not related to the European Magpie, which is a member of the Crow family (164), but is a glorified Butcher-Bird. However, it would be a difficult matter to displace the name magpie for the Australian bird.