3080 Tue Zootocist—Junz, 1872. 
“Tn the summer, however, of 1867, during a visit to Taupo, I was fortu- 
nate enough to find the nest of this species. We had fixed our bivouac for 
the night on the banks of the Waitangi Creek, only a few miles from the 
base of the grand snow-capped Ruapehu. Our native companion soon 
detected the old hawks carrying prey to their young, and on the following 
morning he discovered the nest. It was situated on the ground, under 
cover of a block of trachyte, which cropped out of the side of the hill. There 
had been no attempt to form a proper nest, but the ground was covered with 
the feathers of birds (almost entirely those of ground larks) on which the 
young hawks had been fed. The latter were three in number, of different 
sizes, the largest being apparently three weeks old, and the smallest scarcely 
a fortnight. They were extremely savage, striking vigorously with their 
sharp talons and uttering a peculiar scream. While we were engaged in 
securing them in a basket, the old birds were flying to and fro, occasionally 
dashing up to within a few feet of us, and then off again at a sharp angle, 
alighting at intervals, for a few moments only, on the rugged points of rock 
above us, but never uttering a sound. They were in perfect plumage, and 
when they occasionally poised their bodies overhead, with outspread wings 
and tail, they presented a very beautiful appearance. During our journey 
of forty miles through the bush, the gun supplied the young hawks with a 
sufficiency of food; but they were very voracious, two large pigeons per 
diem being scarcely enough to appease their joint appetites. Fifty miles 
more by canoe, and about forty on horseback, brought the captives to their 
destination, when they were placed in a compartment of the aviary. They 
continued to be very vicious, punishing each other severely with their claws. 
The youngest one was an object of constant persecution, and ultimately 
succumbed to a broken back. A small tame sea-gull that had unwittingly 
wandered into the aviary, through an open doorway, was instantly pounced 
on, although the young hawks, in their unfledged condition, could only 
move by hopping along the ground. In about three weeks these birds 
(which proved to be male and female) had fully assumed the dark plumage, 
and for about two months after they were very clamorous, especially during 
wet or gloomy weather. By degrees they became less noisy, till at length 
they were perfectly silent and moody, never uttering a sound for weeks 
together, with the exception of a peculiar squeal when they were fighting, 
A more quarrelsome couple never existed, the female, being the larger and 
stronger bird, generally came off best, leaving the male severely punished 
about the head. At the end of six months the climax was reached by her 
actually killing and devouring her mate. I found the aviary strewn with 
feathers, and the skeleton of the poor victim picked clean! The surviving 
bird underwent a partial moult in the month of September following, and 
the plumage began to assume a spotted character. The legs also became 
slightly tinged with yellow. By the beginning of March in the following 
