64 Notes and Notices-. [.st'^'juiy 



Tit IPetirvca macrocephala) from Nelson, and a partial albino 

 North Island or Pied Tit {Petrceca toitoi) from Wellington. 



Petrceca macrocephala. — In a normal specimen the male has 

 the head, neck all round, and all the upper parts black, with a 

 white frontal spot, with the under surface a pale lemon-yellow. 

 In this specimen the white frontal spot may be traced, but the 

 whole of the head to the vertex is white, with a suffusion of 

 yellowish ochre, most pronounced near the frontal spot, and 

 diminishing in intensity to the vertex ; intermingled are a few black 

 feathers. The black feathers from the neck, to the base of the 

 tail are tipped for about a quarter of an inch with white, shading 

 off into grey. The rictal bristles white. A line of black feathers 

 over the eyes, and beneath each eye a patch of scattered white 

 feathers. Beneath the mandibles, the neck, and the breast is 

 black, with the edge sharply marked ; the under parts are white, 

 strongly tinged with ochre, darkest near the upper margin. 



The other specimen is a male of Petrceca toitoi ; Upper Hutt, 

 16/7/11. Here the albinism is more complete, the head, breast, 

 abdomen, and back being pure white, more or less interspersed 

 with black feathers, with a black patch at the back of the neck. 

 The right wing has the third and fourth primaries pure white. 

 The outer tail feather on the left side is pure white, and the other 

 tail feathers have a larger proportion of white than usual. The 

 feet and tarsi are normal. The late Sir Walter Buller, in his 

 supplementary work on the " Birds of New Zealand," records a 

 somewhat similar specimen from Otaki (p. 14, vol. ii.), and points 

 out that there is a fine albino in the Wanganui Museum without 

 a single dark feather. 



Strangel}. enough, I have just received a very rare priced 

 catalogue of a sale of the birds which formed part of the great 

 collection of curiosities of all kinds in the London Museum of 

 Natural History, better known by the name of Bullock's Museum, 

 at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly. The collection was a very 

 large one for those days, and was offered to the British Govern- 

 ment previous to the sale for £50,000. 



On the fourth day of the sale — 2nd May, i8ig — lot 52 was 

 " a nondescript Cuckoo, perfectly white, less than half the size 

 of the common, taken in Cornwall and sent to Sir Joseph Banks ; 

 the only one known." The specimen fetched £3 3s., but the name 

 of the purchaser is not recorded. Lot 43 was a very fine speci- 

 men of " the Great Auk — a male — ^the only one taken on the 

 British coast for many years ; and an egg, in glass case." The 

 lucky purchaser secured the lot for £16 5s. 6d. Lot 58 was " an 

 undescribed Ibis " from New Zealand — the only one known. The 

 highest price was given for lot 9^^ — " a red-breasted Goose [Anas 

 rnficollis), male, shot near Berwick, the only one recorded to have 

 been killed in England for upwards of 40 years." This fetched 

 £27. — A. Hamilton, Dominion Museum, Wellington (N.Z.) 



