II.— ZOOLOGY. 



Aet. XIII. — Notes on the Ornithology of Neio Zealand. 

 By Sir Waltee L. Bullee, D.Sc, K.C.M.G., F.E.S. 



[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 17th February, 1897.] 



Plate XI, 



As this will be the last occasion on which I shall have the 

 pleasure of addressing the Society before my departure on a 

 lengthy visit to Europe, I desire, in the first place — before 

 submitting my usual budget of notes — to refer to an address 

 which I gave in June, 1894, under the title of " Illustrations 

 of Darwinism ; or the Avifauna of New Zealand considered 

 in relation to the Fundamental Law of Descent with Modifi- 

 cation." My object at that time was to place before the 

 Society certain facts and inferences derived and deducible 

 from my own observations in this country, extending over a 

 considerable period, in support and illustration of the doctrine 

 of the evolution of species by a process of natural selection, 

 on Darwin's well-known principle of the " survival of the 

 fittest." The address dealt with a debatable subject, and it 

 will be remembered that it led to a discussion in which 

 several members of the Society took part. In order to invite 

 a wider criticism I had 250 extra copies separately printed, 

 and these I distributed among scientific friends and corre- 

 spondents all over the world. It was naturally very gratify- 

 ing to me to receive, as I did, from many quarters appreciative 

 and commendatory letters. It is not my purpose to refer to 

 those letters of approval, except in this general way, as 

 affording an indication of the common acceptance of the 

 doctrine of evolution at the present day — as another proof, 

 if small in its way, of the truth of Professor Newton's 

 remark (quoted in my address) that Darwin's famous book 

 " On the Origin of Species" had effected the greatest revolu- 

 tion of human thought in this or perhaps in any other 

 century. I shall accordingly pass by these letters as a 

 whole, and refer only to those of them which contain, in 

 any sense whatever, adverse criticism of my treatise. My 

 desire is to elicit the truth, whether favourable to my views 

 or otherwise. 



