BuLLER. — On Xew Zealand Burls. 41 



CEstrelata mollis, Gould. 



Among the specimens exhibited to-night is a full-plmnaged 

 example of CEstrelata mollis, a species only rarely met with off 

 the New Zealand coast. This one was sent to me by Mr. 

 T. F. Cheeseman, who obtained it on Sunday Island during his 

 semi-official "^nsit to the Kermadec Group in August, 1887. It 

 was known to the settlers there as the "mutton-bird," and 

 Mr. Cheeseman treated it as an undetermined species of 

 Majaqueus. I have another example in my collection, from 

 Otago ; and if, as I believe, my birds are male and female, the 

 sexes present no difference in plumage. 



This species was originally described by Mr. Gould in 

 the "Annals and Magazine of Natural History" (vol. xiii., 

 p. 363) ; and in his account of it in " The Birds of Australia " 

 he records a very remarkable circumstance. " It is a species,'' 

 he says, " that will ever Hve in my memory, from its being the 

 first large Petrel I saw after crossing the Line, and from a some- 

 what curious incident that then occurred. The weather being 

 too boisteroxts to admit of a boat being lowered, I endeavoured 

 to capture the bird with a hook and line ; and, the ordinary sea- 

 hooks being too large for the purpose, I was in the act of 

 selecting one from my stock of salmon-flies, when a sudden 

 gust of wind blew my hooks, and a piece of parchment lOin. 

 long by Gin. wide, between which they were placed, overboard 

 into the sea, and I was obliged to give up the attempt for that 

 day. On the next I succeeded in capturing the bird with a 

 hook I had still left, and the reader may judge of my surprise 

 when, on opening the stomach, I there found the piece of 

 parchment, softened by the action of the salt water and the 

 animal juices to which it had been subjected, but so com- 

 pletely uninjured that it was dried and again restored to its 

 original use when a further supply of flies could be procured." 



CEstrelata affinis, BuUer. 



I exhibit a pair of these birds lately brought from the 

 Auckland Islands. There is no appreciable difference in the 

 plumage of the two sexes ; but in the male bird the speckled 

 markings on the forehead are more conspicuous, whilst there 

 is a richer tinge of brown on the arm of the forewing. 

 Another, which I obtained, in June last, from the east coast 

 of Otago, has gone to England, where hitherto my type- 

 specimen has been unique. The characters by which I 

 distinguished the species are constant in all these examples. 

 Dr. Otto Finsch, without seeing the bird, proposed to unite it 

 to CEstrelata mollis ; but Mr. Osbert Salvin, our great authority 

 on Petrels, on comparing my bird with the large series of the 

 hxtter species in the British ^luseum, unhesitatingly agreed 

 with me that it was quite distinct. On comparing the two 



