200 Transactions.— Zoology. 
The same correspondent, in connection with this species, has furnished 
me with another instance of the law of assimilative colouring in eggs for 
protective purposes. In December, 1875, he visited the Rurima Rocks, in 
the Bay of Plenty, and found large numbers of Larus scopulinus breeding 
there. In some localities the nests—roughly formed and lined with 
feathers—were placed in the thick masses of wild spinach or in the midst 
of ‘‘sand-fire.” In all such cases he observed that the eggs which these 
nests contained were splashed over their entire surface with large green 
blotches, thus assimilating their colour to the surrounding vegetation ; 
whilst other eggs (belonging to the same species), deposited on the white 
sand in the immediate vicinity, had a totally different appearance, being of 
a light stone-colour, and so marked as to harmonize exactly with the sandy 
surroundings. 
STERCORARIUS PARASITIOUS, Linn.—Buffon’s Skua. 
I have to exhibit to the Society another specimen of the skua, or 
plundering gull (in immature plumage), killed in Wellington harbour in 
the early part of the present year, and purchased by me from Mr. Liardet. 
This is the third recorded instance of the occurrence of this species in New 
Zealand.* 
Popicers cristatus, Lath.—Crested Grebe. 
I have never met with this species in the North Island, but Captain 
Mair informs me that he has on two occasions seen it in Waikaremoana 
Lake in the Urewera country, and once on the Waikareiti, another lake in 
the same vicinity 
Popicers nurrIPECTUS, Gray.—Dabchick. 
The following is an interesting fact in connection with the local range of 
this little grebe which is almost incapable of flight :— 
Mount Edgecumbe is a high volcanic cone on the banks of the Rangi- 
taiki River some fifteen miles from the sea. At the bottom of the now 
extinct crater there is a small pool of water about thirty yards across. In 
this pool Captain Mair, in 1868, observed three of these dabchicks disporting 
themselves in the water. Some months after the same number was seen 
again in the same place by Dr. Nesbitt and Dr. Manley, and again by 
another party of visitors a considerable time afterwards. There are lagoons 
at the foot of the mountain frequented by these birds; but the singular 
fact is that those inhabiting the basin must have climbed up the cone, which 
is thickly covered on the outside with dense scrubby vegetation, and then 
down the crater, which contains a heavy forest-growth right down to the 
. edge of the pool. 
Captain Mair states that the dabchick is very plentiful in the Hot 
~ * See “ Birds of N.Z.," p. 268; and “ Trans. N.Z. Inst," VIL, p. 225. 
