STRUTHIONES. 45 



the statement of a well-known author that it is capable of ^inflicting 

 a dangerous blow, sometimes even killing a dog ! ' 



" While hunting for its food the bird makes a continual sniffing 

 sound through the nostrils^ which are placed at the extremity of the 

 upper mandible. Whether it is guided as much by touch as by smell 

 I cannot safely say ; but it appears to me that both senses are called 

 into action. That the sense of tou.ch is highly developed seems quite 

 certain, because the bird, although it may not be audibly sniffing, will 

 always first touch an object with the point of its bill, whether in the 

 act of feeding or surveying the ground ; and when shut up in a cage 

 or confined in a room it may be heard, all through the night, tapping 

 softly at the walls. The sniffing sound to which I have referred is 

 only heard when the Kiwi is in the act of feeding or hunting for 

 food; but I have sometimes observed the bird touching the ground 

 close to or immediately round a worm which it had dropped without 

 being able to find it. I have remarked, moreover, that the Kiwi will 

 pick up a worm or piece of meat as readily from the bottom of a 

 vessel filled with water as from the ground, never seizing it, however, 

 till it has first touched it with its bill in the manner described. It is 

 probable that, in addition to a highly-developed olfactory power, there 

 is a delicate nervous sensitiveness in the terminal enlargement of the 

 upper mandible. It is interesting to watch the bird, in a state of 

 freedom, foraging for worms, which constitute its principal food : 

 it moves about with a slow action of the body; and the long flexible 

 bill is driven into the soft ground, generally home to the very root, 

 and is either immediately withdrawn with a worm held at the extreme 

 tip of the mandibles, or it is gently moved to and fro, by an action 

 of the head and neck, the body of the bird being perfectly steady. 

 It is amusing to observe the extreme care and deliberation with which 

 the bird draws the worm from its hiding-place, coaxing it out, as it 

 were, by degrees, instead of pulling roughly or breaking it. On 

 getting the worm fairly out of the ground, it throws up its head with 

 a jerk, and swallows it whole. ^' — Buller. 



55. Apteryx australis. SJmw. 



South Island Kiwi. 



(Plate XX.) 



G-reyish-browD, streaked witli black : feathers, soft to the touch. 



L., 23 ; B., 6-5 ; T., 2-5. 



Very variable in size, and slightly so in colour. 



-%^.— White ; oval ; length, 5 ; breadth, 3-3. 



Rab. — South Island. 



