The Zoologist — April, 1874, 3937 



the forest, yet it seeks and loves the shady covert of the densest 

 bush, where decaying tree and damp mosses conceal an insect-food 

 supply. It does not appear to be strong on the wing ; we have 

 never seen it attempt a lengthened flight, yet its movements are 

 notably prompt, rapid and decided. It usually announces its 

 sudden approach by a shrill note unlike that of any other bird we 

 know ; it sounds like "chee-per-per, chee-per-per," repeated several 

 times in quick succession. No sooner is this call-note heard than 

 the bird emerges from its leafy screen and bounds before the 

 spectator as suddenly as harlequin in a pantomime. From these 

 abrupt movements, or flying leaps, thus shrilly accompanied, it 

 seeems to perform a role of its own that appears almost startling 

 amidst the umbrageous serenity of the forest. Let the eye follow 

 its motions, that are so quickly changed, and watch the tieke 

 perched for a kw moments on the lichen-mottled bole of some 

 fallen tree — a favourite position: its glossy black plumage is 

 relieved from sameness by the quaint saddle-mark of deep ferru- 

 ginous that crosses its back and wings ; the red caruncles add 

 much to the sprightliness of its air: the observer will probably 

 notice that its attitude is peculiar, or, in colonial phrase, "it has a 

 queer set on it." The head and tail are kept rather elevated ; the 

 feathers of the tail take a gently sweeping curve ; the bird looks as 

 though prepared to leap : one more glance, and it is away, climbing 

 some moss-clothed trunk, or picking its food from beneath the 

 flakes and ragged strips of bark that hang from the brown-stemmed 

 fuchsia tree. It must be an early breeder. On the Teremakau we 

 have seen the young, almost of adult size, in the first week of 

 December. For its nesting-place a hollow or decayed tree is 

 usually selected, sometimes the top of a tree-fern is preferred. The 

 first nest we knew of was found by an old friend in a hole about 

 four feet from the ground in a huge white pine, kahikalea [Podo- 

 carpus dacrydoides) , close to the bank of the Ahaura river; it 

 contained three eggs hard-set. We found a nest in a dead tree- 

 fern not far from Lake Mapourika, Westland : this was of slight 

 construction, built principally of fern-root, deftly woven into rather 

 a deep-shaped nest with thin walls; as the structure just filled the 

 hollow top of the tree-fern thick walls were unnecessary. Another 

 nest, in a small-sized decayed tree in the Okarita bush, was in a 

 hole not more than three feet from the ground ; it was roughly 

 constructed, principally of fibres and midribs of decayed leaves of 



