IIYPOT.KMDIA 



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Ihfol.niiJui hwlnfns uiiinin- anion- -rass, and on -oin- closer saw the old bird. It made 

 various noises, being employed, I thought, in callin.i; to its youn-; one note was like 'crick crick,' 

 loudly and harshly sounded ; another, fre.|uently repeated, was like the tapping' of stone on ice'; 

 and yet another, an uncanny sort of sound. Lastly the note that fust attracted my notice and 

 caused me to catch sight of the black chick, was a sort of half booming half coomg sound. I 

 was walking down the side of a fence, and heard the noise in some rough tussocky "ground and 

 swampy scrub on the other side of the lailway. On the 2nd November, 1886, I saw one of these 

 Kails on Pelican Island, Woolnortii. It Hew a few yards from under my feet, among the tussocks 

 and low shrubs on the highest part of the island. Afterwards I saw a tiny black chick running 

 in the herbage at the spot where the Rail Hew from. In May, 1887, my dog liushed another of 

 these birds in the swamp between the village paddock and the Greenhills ; it tlew slowly, with 

 laboured Happing and hanging legs. 1 have since seen one on the neck of Circular 'llead 

 Peninsula, and have also found them on Walker's and Kobbin's Islands, from whence I brought 

 home two specimens, and might have secured several more." 



Near Sydney this species breeds in the Botany X'vater Reserve, at Long Bay and Little Bay. 

 On the 15111 .\ugust, 1904, Mr. L. Harrison brought me three freshly blown eggs belonging to 

 this species for verification, and subse.iuently presented the nest from which they were" taken 

 to the Trustees, accompanied with the following notes :— " On the 13th August, 1904, I went to 

 Little Bay, and while beating about some ferns (Glachcnia cirduata), in a small swam'p, I found 

 a nearly Hat nest, well hidden from \iew, containing three fresh eggs. The nest was resting on 

 a tangle of grasses under the fern, about two feet up, and only twelve feet away from the tmm 

 rails. I made a further search and discovered two other nests near the ground, with very well 

 worn tracks radiating from them." 



The nest is a shallow, saucer-shaped structure, f.)rnied of coarse, dead straw-like sheaths of 

 plant stalks, with which is intermingled a large quantity of very line green grass stems. It 

 averages e.xternally seven inches in diameter, by two inches in depth, and the saucer-like cavity 

 is three quarters of an inch deep in the centre. 



The eggs are usually four or five, rarely six, in number for a sitting, and vary from oval to 

 a rounded-oval and an ellipse in form, the shell being close-grained, smooth and more or less 

 lustrous. The ground colour varies from a light warm creamy-white to a dull white, over which 

 are scattered freckles, short streaks and irregular-shaped spots and blotches of purplish-brown, 

 chestnut-brown and similar, but fewer, underlying markings of violet-grey ; in some specimens 

 the markings are fairly evenly distributed, in others they predominate on the thicker end, where 

 they form an irregular cap or zone. Two types may be found in the same set. I have a set of 

 five now before me, taken by Mr. i\Ialcolm Harrison, at Risdon Swamp, near Hobart, Tasmania, 

 on the 6th October, 1894, which are as described above, except one specimen, on which the 

 markings are confined almost entirely to the thicker end, these consist chiefly of large underlying 

 blotches of rich violet-grey, with a comparatively few surface dots and spots of chestnut-brown! 

 Thisset measures:— Length (A) 1-41 x i-02 inches; (B) 1-42 x 1-07 inches; (C) 1-37 x i 

 inches; (D) 1-35 x 1-03 inches; (E) 1-35 x 1-07 inches. A remarkably even sized set of six 

 in Mr. M. Harrison's collection, taken in the same locality on the 17th October, 1 901, measures :— 

 Length (A) 1-35 x 1-03 inches; (B) 1-33 x 1-03 inches; (C) 1-33 x i-oi inches; (D) 1-34 x 

 1-03 inches; (E) 1-35 x 1-03 inches. 



Young birds of both sexes differ from the adults in having the entire upper parts, including 

 the head and hind-neck, dusky brown, and narrower light olive-brown margins to the scapulars 

 and feathers of the back; chin and centre of throat white; lores, cheeks, sides of neck and upper 

 breast dusky-brown, the feathers on the sides of throat tipped with dull olive-brown ; sides of the 

 lower breast dull slaty-grey, tinged with olive and indistinctly barred with brownish-white; 

 thighs and vent dull slaty-grey. Total length in the flesh 7-3 inches, wing yy 



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