82 RECORDS OF THE ATJSTRALl'AIT MTJSETJM:. 



diversity of additional forms which might be expected by 

 research. 



Our knowledge of the native Arachnid and Arachnoid parasites is 

 too meagre, as far as the exact determination of species is con- 

 cerned, to yet attempt even a preliminary list. 



On a specimen op CREX CREX, SHOT at RAND WICK, 

 NEW SOUTH WALES. 



By Alfred J. North, F.L.S., Assistant in Ornithology. 



Recently Mr. H. Newcombe, Deputy Registrar-General of 

 Titles, presented a freshly shot specimen of Crex crex to the 

 Trustees of the Australian Museum. The bird was obtained the 

 previous day, June 14th, 1893, by Mr. Walter Higgs, who was shoot- 

 ing in a scrubby portion of the Rifle Range at Randwick, a well 

 known haunt of the RalUdce. It was an adult female, and upon 

 dissection the ovaries were found to be fairly developed. This 

 species ranges throughout Western Asia, Europe, and the United 

 Kingdom, it also occurs in Northern and North-eastern Africa, 

 and the late Mr. Gurney records it as common during the summer 

 months as far South as Natal, a straggler also being recorded by 

 Mr. Ayres from Cape Colony. It occurs in Asia Minor, Arabia, 

 and Turkestan, and it is stated by Mr. Seebohm to be common 

 as far North and East as the Altai Mountains ; also Dr. Sharpe 

 recently records it in a collection of birds from Fao in the Persian 

 Gulf, but it is not included either by Hume or Murray in the 

 Indian avifauna. Stragglers are recorded by Professor Baird to 

 the Eastern coast of the United States, and Dresser, in his Birds of 

 Europe, states a specimen was said to have been once obtained 

 near Nelson, in New Zealand, but on what authority I know 

 not. Sir Walt(>r Buller does not include it in his Birds of New 

 Zealand. Previously this species has not been recorded from Aus- 

 tralia, and although possessed of great powers of flight, it is hard 

 to imagine that the specimen obtained at Randwick, should it 

 have succeeded in reaching Northern Australia by the way of 

 India, Sumatra, and Java, would still have wandered so much 

 farther out of its normal range by crossing the continent to South- 

 eastern Australia. The occurrence of this bird within a few miles 

 of Sydney, where a number of foreign birds are frequently brought 



