Vol. XIX. 



] Snui-1-LDT, Material for a Study of the Megapodiidai. 10 



No. 146,775. — Same as last. (Sex ?) Crested. Label = .1/. /. 



afinis. (This may l)e M. affinis, Meyer, A. B. ?) 

 No. i4(),778, J. -Mas. Boucard. {Megapodiiis jobiensis.) Coll., 



Bruijn, Tohie (Jul)idsland ?) Second label. — A. A. Bruijn, 



Ternate. Meg. affinis. (Conspicuously crested ; dark 



species ; large feet. — R. W. S.) 

 I find in the collection no skins of Megapodiiis brnnneiventris 

 (A. B. Meyer, p. 452), a species found in south-east New Guinea. 

 There is an unidentified specimen from New Guinea, which is 

 rather a large species. It is crested, and it is brown above and 

 grey on the lower parts. The neck is bare and feet small. 

 Geisler collected it, but no date is given. (No. 126,040, ,S, adult.) 

 There is a Megapode about which I have been unable to gather 

 any information. Lister, in his above-quoted article, speaks of 

 it as follows : — " In 1887 Mr. T. F. Cheeseman, the well-known 

 Curator of the Auckland Museum, to whose knowledge and kind- 

 ness many visitors to New Zealand are indebted, visited the 

 Kermadec Islands, which are a scattered group lying nearly 

 half-way between the North Island of New Zealand and the 

 Tonga Islands, to the N.N.E., and some 400 or 500 miles from 

 either. . . (Extensive summing-up here, and description of a 

 bird building a mound and breeding in the old crater.) Mr. 

 Cheeseman cautiously observes that the evidence, such as it is, 

 seems to point to the former existence of a species of Megapodiiis 

 on this island " (" On the Birds of Kermadec Islands," Trans, and 

 Proc. of the N. Zealand Institute, vol. xxiii., 1890, p. 2ig). 



There appear to be no skins in the National Museum collection 

 of Megapodiiis macgillivrayi, a species occurring in south-east 

 New Guinea and Louisiade Islands (see Gray, p. 453).* This 

 likewise applies to Megapodiiis eremita, of the East Papuan Islands 

 (Hart., p. 452), a species which has been described and referred to 

 by not a few ornithologists.! 



There is still another Megapode, of which 1 have little or no 

 information. Sharpc does not list it in the " Hand-list " ; there 

 are no skins of it in the collection of the United States Nati(Hial 

 Museum — this is Megapodius brenchleyi. C. M. Wood\\'ard, in his 

 work on " The NaturaUst Among the Head Hunters," refers to 

 the peculiarities of its nesting habits, &c. (pp. ioo-ioi).J 



Megapodius duperreyi. 

 (Less, and Garn., p. 454.) 

 This is a species which has attracted very considerable attention, 

 and one that enjoys a very wide range for its habitat, being found 



* Sclater, P. L., Proc. Zool. Soc. Loud., 1876, p. 460, pi. xliii. This article 

 is illustrated by an excellent plate of the bird, which I have seen. 



t Sclater, P. L., " Voy. Challenger," p. 32, pi. xi. (1880) [Pigeon Island, 

 Admiralty Group] ; Studer, T., in " Forchnngsreise S. M. S. Gazelle," iii., 

 p. 253, pi. xii. ; Meyer, A. B., Ibis, 1890, p. 423 (no figures, but describes eggs 

 of M. brenchleyi and M. eremite) ; Brazier, juo., " Kggs ol McjapodiidcB," 

 P.Z.S., 1874, p. 607. 



X See also P.Z.S., 188S, pp. 249, 250. 



