Letters, Announcements, ^c. 135 



came to the conclusiou that our Australian Bustard did not 

 possess a gular pouch of any kind, having merely the power of 

 greatly extending the gullet at pleasure. Having for several 

 days chased a fine old male without getting a shot at him, I at 

 last procured him, and found him to be by far the largest I had 

 ever examined, weighing 20 lb. and standing 4 feet high. I 

 carefully looked underneath and all round the tongue before 

 separating the membrane from the sides of the lower mandible, 

 and next morning began to skin him, carefully turning back 

 the skin when I came to the neck, and afterwards separating 

 the trachea, gullet, and so on from the body and head, taking 

 in the tongue. I then washed and carefully examined it, in- 

 flating every part of the gullet with air, to see if there was any 

 distention in any part of it, and I found nothing whatever 

 approaching to a pouch. 



I remain, &c., 



Edward P. Ramsay. 



In continuation of my letter of last year (Ibis, 1866, p. 222), 

 I may mention that there were again this spring two Hoopoes' 

 {Upupa epops) nests in my verandah, and in the same place. 



I find that the hens do leave the nest once or twice a day ; 

 but I have never seen them stay out longer than to give time 

 to get rid of their droppings, and I have never seen either of 

 them on the ground when out. Generally speaking they perch 

 on a tree near at hand, and, after sitting a few moments for the 

 purpose mentioned, fly back to the nest. Two or three times 

 (once when Dr. Jerdon was sitting in my verandah) one of the 

 hens flew out, passed her dropping whilst on the wing, and 

 returned to the nest without having settled anywhere. They 

 are fed most indefatigably by the cocks, and the number of 

 grubs, small worms and so forth, destroyed by them is very 

 great. Curious to say, I saw a Hoopoe killing a locust, which I 

 hardly thought its bill capable of doing. Unfortunately it was 

 disturbed, and flew away, leaving the insect dead on the ground, 

 so that I had no opportunity of ascertaining how it would have 

 managed to swallow such a large morsel. 



Three young ones from one nest and two from the other 



