46 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST 



katipos, and killed a mouse and a powerful rat, which died forty- 

 eight hours after being bitten. 



Among all the Victorian specimens I have never seen any 

 appearance of the Red Cross form to which I have alluded. 



Since my lecturette, I have been informed that the red-backed 

 Victorian spider's thread is made use of for micrometer threads at 

 the Observatory, as being most serviceable for that purpose. But 

 the creature is rather indisposed to promote scientific inquiry, being 

 shy in spinning her yarn in order to measure the heavenly bodies. 



The Katipo. — A venomous insect occasionally found among 

 the tufts of grass on the sandy beaches of New Zealand. Its 

 sting creates a painful swelling. I don't think it is often fatal. 

 It is a very retiring insect, seldom seen unless sought after. The 

 Maories used to describe it as something like a centipede, with 

 a red head. There is a proverb among the Maories respecting 

 it — " Kaua koe e noho ki runga ki te papapa o te onepu : ka 

 katia koe e te katipo." If you will sit on the tufts on the shore 

 you may expect to be stung by the katipo. Moral. — Don't put 

 yourself in the way of temptation. The derivation is from kati, to 

 sting — po, the night. — Rev. S. Ironside, Balaclava. 



English Notes. — Letters received by the hon. secretary from 

 Mr. T. A. Forbes-Leith, a former vice-president of the Club, now 

 in England, contain several items of interest to naturalists. He 

 has added to his collection of parrots several very handsome 

 species, among them being a specimen of the rare and beautiful 

 little blue Otaheite parrakeet. He expresses himself in strong 

 terms of admiration at Miss North's gallery of paintings from 

 nature, praising her perseverance, genius, etc., and her execution 

 and exhaustive manipulation of detail in many of the most difficult 

 of foreign trees, flowers, and birds — in fact, to his mind, is far 

 superior to many of the old masters. He mentions being 

 present at a sale of natural history specimens in London, when 

 an egg of the great auk (believed to be extinct) was sold for 

 ^i6o. After some considerable trouble, he procured a photo- 

 graph of another auk's egg in a private collection, and describes 

 it as being about five inches long, and resembles in shape an 

 Australian native companion's, though much larger. It has 

 somewhat large, dark spots towards the smaller end of the egg, 

 with other fainter and smaller ones on the other portion. India 

 has fixed a close season for birds owing to the great destruction 

 of birds for hat decorations, etc. A golden eagle — a bird rarely 

 met with in England — has been shot in Surrey. In a later letter 

 Mr. Leith mentions having been present at the sale of another 

 auk's egg, which fetched the enormous sum of J^22^. He 

 has added to his collection three humming birds' nests, wiih 

 ■eggs, the nests being not larger than half a walnut. 



