Vol. XX. J Mathews, Nature of New Zealand Avifauna. 221 



still persisting. The northern invasions are not easily traceable, 

 but we cannot dogmatize by stating that they were through New 

 Caledonia or Norfolk Island, and it is possible that a way existed 

 of which we have no trace. It is possible that some of the earlier 

 invasions took place simultaneously with an Australian invasion, 

 which would account for some of the peculiarities, but we do not 

 think that any direct colonization of New Zealand from zA.ustraha 

 has taken place except in the undoubted case of Zosterops ; 

 consequently there can be no comparison of the Neozelanic avi- 

 fauna with that of Tasmania, as, the latter simply shows, with 

 scarcely an intrusive element, the northern forms which travelled 

 down Australia from the north before the separation of Tasmania 

 from the mainland. It is also admitted that Tasmania may have 

 been connected with Antarctica even as New Zealand was, but 

 this connection was at a later date, when most of the peculiar 

 forms had been dissipated. The Tasmanian endemic genus 

 Tnbonyx is only an island form of Microtribonyx, of larger bulk 

 and less flight. Much confusion has been caused through the 

 misunderstanding by paleontologists of the convergence in 

 flightlessness in the Ralhne birds, but when Andrews described 

 a fossil Tribonyx from Madagascar he drew attention to this fact, 

 pointing out that there was little reason to suggest that this was 

 really a Tnbonyx. 



We might note that in The Ibis for 1913 we pubhshed a reference- 

 list of the birds of New Zealand, which contains much of interest, 

 a majority of the points in Hall's paper (1920) being discussed in 

 that place seven years before. 



A New Menura : Prince Edward's Lyre'Bird. 



By a. H. Chisholm, R.A.O.U., Brisbane. 



Inasmuch as the Australian Lyre-tails are among the most 

 remarkable and fascinating of the world's birds, and by reason 

 of the fact that their habitat and range are restricted, importance 

 attaches to the discovery of any variant from the type, and even 

 to the recording of any extension of locality. The type-bird of 

 the genus, Menura superba (Da vies), ranks as one of the earliest 

 of important "finds" in Australian ornithology; a markedly 

 different species, M. alberti, was named by John Gould in 1850 ; 

 and a third species, M. victories, was separated from the type 

 species by the same great ornithologist in 1862. 



Nearly 60 years having elapsed since the latter date (and over 

 100 years since the discovery of the type species), it is somewhat 

 extraordinary that it is now possible to put forward, with a con- 

 siderable degree of confidence, what is apparently a better 

 variant from the type of the genus than is Gould's victoria. 

 Moreover, it has to be said at once that the new bird hails from 

 Queensland — a State which was previously supposed to harbour 



