52 The Zoologist — February, 1866. 



purpose of incubating its eggs: their statement appeared so extra- 

 ordinary, and so much at variance with the general habits of birds, 

 that no one in the settlement believed them or took sufficient interest 

 in the matter to examine the'raomids, and thus to verify or refute their 

 accounts ; another circumstance which induced a doubt of their 

 veracity was the great size of tlie eggs brought in by the natives as 

 those of this bird. Aware that the eggs of Leipoa were hatched in a 

 similar manner, ray attention was immediately arrested by these 

 accounts, and I at once determined to ascertain all I possibly could 

 respecting so singular a feature in the bird's economy ; and, having 

 procured the assistance of a very intelligent native, who undertook to 

 guide me to the different places resorted to by the bird, I proceeded 

 on the 16lh of November to Knocker's Bay, a part of Port Essington 

 Harbour comparatively but little known, and where 1 had been in- 

 formed a number of these birds were always to be seen. I landed 

 beside a thicket, and had not proceeded fur from the shore ere 1 came 

 to a mound of sand and shells, with a slight mixture of black soil, the 

 base resting on a sandy beach, only a few feet above high-water mark ; 

 it was enveloped in the large yellow-blossomed Hibiscus, was of a coni- 

 cal form, twenty feet in circumference at the base and about five feet in 

 height. On pointing it out to the native and asking him what it was, 

 he replied, ' Ooon-goorga Rambal,' Megapodc's house or nest. I then 

 scrambled up the sides of it, and to my extreme delight found a young 

 bird in a hole about two feet deep ; it was lying on a few dry withered 

 leaves, and apjjeared to be only a few days old. So far I was satisfied 

 that these mounds had some connexion with the bird's mode of incu- 

 bation j but I was still sceptical as to the probability of these young 

 birds ascending from so great a depth as the natives represented ; and 

 my suspicions were confirmed b}' my being unable to induce the native, 

 in this instance, to search for the ej^gs, his excuse being that " he knew 

 it would be useless, as he saw no traces of the old birds having recently 

 been there." I look the utmost care of the young bird, intending to 

 rear it, if possible; I therefore obtained a moderately sized box, and 

 placed in it a large portion of sand. As it fed rather freely on bruised 

 Indian corn, 1 was in full hopes of succeeding; but it proved of so 

 wild and intractable a disposition that it would not reconcile itself to 

 such close confinement, and effected its escape on the third day. 

 During the period it remained in captivity it was incessantly occupied 

 in scratching up the .sand into heaps ; and the rapidity with which it 

 threw the sand from one end of the box to the other was quite sur- 



