158 NATURAL SCIENCE. March. 



nothing quite so humorous as facts, and here we have something to 

 support the assertion. We observe imprimis that Mr. White does not 

 live in the kea country, but probably 400 miles from it. He quitted 

 the desolate mountains of the South Island many years ago. To 

 judge by the extract before us, the original food of the kea was not 

 berries, but ' lichens on stones,' that it took to tearing these off, and 

 then, mistaking a dead sheep for a lichen on a stone, tasted that and 

 found it beaksome. It lived on the mountains far above the region 

 of berries. Now, there is a well-known idea among shepherds that 

 the strange habit of the kea did arise somewhat in this way, but not 

 from a taste for lichens. There is, in the alpine regions of the South 

 Island, a plant popularly called the ' vegetable sheep,' botanically 

 named Raonlia. From the distance of even a few yards it looks like 

 a sheep. It grows in great masses, and consists of a woolly vege- 

 tation. A large specimen of this singular plant was exhibited in the 

 Colonial and Indian Exhibition.' It is said that the kea was in the 

 habit of tearing it up to get at the grubs which harbour within the 

 mass, and that mistaking dead sheep for vegetable sheep it learned 

 the taste of mutton. A more enterprising generation preferred its 

 mutton rather fresher. Lichens do not come in here. As for the 

 kea living above the region of trees, that is simple nonsense. It is 

 an alpine bird which descends to comparatively low levels at times. 

 It is well known in the region of shrubs about the Mount Cook 

 Hermitage. It is said not to have learned to attack sheep in that 

 district yet — unless during the last few years. We have it on the 

 best authority that when specimens are shot their mouths contain 

 seeds and berries, and we see no reason to doubt that these were once 

 their regular food. The forest level in this province is up to, say, 

 3,000 feet, but shrubs bearing berries are found much higher, and in 

 Canterbury higher still." 



Dr. Charles Janet on the Hornet. 



We have received a number of Dr. Janet's interesting studies on 

 wasps, hornets, and their allies. In one of these, a note on Vespa 

 cvahvo {Mem. Soc. Zool. de France, 1895), he gives a detailed account 

 of the construction of the hornet's nest, with many notes on the 

 habits of the insect. It seems that hornets do great damage to trees 

 by nibbling the young shoots, so as to get their juices. Dr. Janet 

 (^ives an ingenious explanation of the peculiar folding of hornets' 

 anterior wings. The hind margin of the fore-wing, he says, becomes 

 engaged in the front margin of the hind-wing, and is compelled to 

 fold longitudinally, since otherwise it would force the hind-wing over 

 the dorsal surface of the abdomen, as, indeed, occasionally happens in 

 young individuals. If the wings came to lie dorsal to the abdomen, 

 they would become frayed and torn in the narrow passages of the 



1 And may now be seen at the Natural History Museum. — Ed. Nat. Sci. 



