254 Transactions. 



Tau mahana. — A warm season ; prolific. 



Tau horahora ; tau hua ; tau ruru ; tau kai. — A prolific sea- 

 son ; food products plentiful. 



Tau matao. — A cold, unprolific season. 



Tau tuhuroa. — Slow growth of crops ; late fruiting of trees, &c^ 



Tau tane. 



Tau wahine. — Denotes quick growth, abundant foliage, good 

 crops. 



Tau niho roa. — A season during which birds and rats eat all 

 kinds of food. Rats bold at eating crops. 



Tau maro. — A backward season ; poor growth of crops, &c. 



If the riroriro bird builds its roofed nest with the entrance 

 thereto facing the north, the prevailing winds of the coming 

 season will be from the south. When the forest-trees com- 

 mence flowering, or the fruit forms, on the lower branches first, 

 and so proceeds upwards, a tau mahana, or prolific season, fol- 

 lows ; there will be no late frosts. But if such blossoming, 

 &c, begins on the uppermost branches, and so on downwards, 

 then a tau matao ensues. 



Inasmuch as our forest-lore notes are scarce half-completed, 

 we will here cease our labours for a space, leaving the balance 

 for the days that lie before. E rau rangi pea ka kitea. 



Art. XVI. — Additions to the New Zealand Molluscan Fauna. 

 By W. H. Webster, B.A., Waiukn. 

 [Re<id before the Auckland Institute. l'2tli December, 1907.] 

 Plates XX and XXI. 



Acanthochites (Loboplax) mariae, n. sp. Plate XX, figs. 1—11. 



Shell elongated, elevated, dorsal angle about 110. Colour 

 greenish-grey, minutely freckled with dark. Latero-pleural areas 

 crowded with flattened granules, strap-shaped or oval, as in 

 ./. zelandicus, all the valves being bordered with irregular, 

 raised, white, pebble-like granules of the same type as those 

 in A. violaceus, with which this species also agrees in having 5 

 prominent lobes on the anterior valve, the ribs being of white 

 raised elongated granules, the ribs of all valves similarly marked ; 

 another characteristic feature is the presence of three almond- 

 shaped white granules just within the posterior edge of each 

 median valve. Dorsal areas wedge-shaped, the edges being 

 serrated, sculptured with cuneiform lyrulse. The posterior 



