A'phanapteY jx of Mauritius a7id Chatham Islands. 65 



plumage begins to appear, and is complete about the end of 

 August or beginning of September ; no further moult takes 

 place till the following spring. 



This species is distinguished from all other members of 

 the genus Lagopus by having the primaries brownish black. 



From the above remarks it will be seen that two very- 

 extraordinary facts have been ascertained beyond doubt : — 



1. That the male gets no distinct summer plumage, but 

 has distinct autumn and lointer plumages, and retains the 

 latter throu"-hout the breeding-season. 



2. That the female has a distinct summer plumage, which 

 is complete by the end of April ; also a distinct autumn 

 plumage, but never assumes a distinct winter garb, retaining 

 her autumn plumage till the following spring. 



XIX. — Note on the Aphanapteryx of Mauritius and of the 

 Chatham Islands. By H. O. Forbes. 



The importance, from the point of view of the geographical 

 distribution of life in the Southern Hemisphere, of the accu- 

 rate determination of the osteological remains discovered last 

 year in the Chatham Islands, and of having them identified 

 or not with the types preserved in the Cambridge University 

 JMuseum, has induced me to anticipate my fuller paper on 

 the remains of the extinct birds of the New-Zealand region, 

 by presenting to those interested in this subject careful figures 

 (two thirds of the natural size) of some of their more important 

 bones. I have selected those which have been described and 

 figured by Sir Edward Newton and Dr. Gadowin their valuable 

 ])ajjer "On Additional Bones of the Dodo and other Extinct 

 Birds of Mauritius obtained by ]\Ir. Theodore Sauzicr," read 

 before the Zoological Society of London on November 1st, 

 ]892, and about to appear in the next part of the ' Transac- 

 tions ' of the Society. Through Dr. Gadow's kindness in 

 giving me a proof of this paper, to facilitate my comparison of 

 the Chatham-Island material with the Mauritian, I am able to 

 exhibit figures of the types of the premaxiUa, the left humerus, 

 and the sternum by the side of the corresi}onding bones from 

 the Chatham Islands. The remains from the former locality 

 are more fragmentary than those from the latter. Of the 

 cranium from Mauritius no more, with the exception of the 

 mandible, is known than is shown in fig. 2, Several of the 

 skulls of Aphanaptery.v JIaio/cinsi, on the other hand, are 

 absolutely comi)lete except for their pterygoid bones, which 

 Ann. d; Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 6. FbZ. xii. 5 



