i182 Transactions.—Zoology. 
further observations, relating for the most part to the nests and eges of 
those species whose history is still imperfect. 
As it is my intention to publish, at an early date, a new and revised 
edition of my ‘“ Birds of New Zealand,” in a cheaper form, to serve as a 
hand-book for students in the colony, I am anxious myself to collect, and 
to encourage others to record in the pages of our ‘‘ Transactions,’ any new 
facts in the economy and life history of our native birds. 
Some of the nests and eggs mentioned in this paper have already been 
described by Mr. Potts in his usual happy style; but there is an obvious 
advantage in having, for comparison, the accounts of independent observers 
who often look at the same object from different points of view. And as 
the value of observations in natural history depends entirely on their 
accuracy, I offer no apology for the minuteness of some of my descriptions. 
Fico Nov#-ZEALANDIE. 
Tn the fine collection of New Zealand birds’ eggs in the Canterbury 
Museum (brought together chiefly through the industry of Mr. T. H. Potts, 
F.L.§., and his sons), there is a singular specimen of the egg of the above 
species. It is very ovoido-elliptical in form, measuring 2.25 inches by 1.4, 
of a warm sepia-brown, prettily freckled and spotted, more thickly so in the 
middle, and confluent in a large patch at the larger end, with reddish- 
brown, varied with darker brown. 
F'aco FEROX. 
There is a beautiful specimen of the bush hawk’s egg in the same col- 
lection, from the Chatham Islands. It is of a rich or warm reddish-brown 
freckled, and slightly smudged with darker brown, presenting a close 
resemblance to the merlin’s egg, “broadly ovoido-conical in form, and 
measuring 1.95 inch by 1.50 inch. There is another ege of the same 
species, from Paringa River, South Westland, differing very perceptibly, in 
being of a dull cream colour, freckled and stained all over with brown. It 
is of the same size as the Chatham Island specimen, but is slightly more 
oval in form. 
SPILOGLAUX NOVE-ZEALANDIN. 
Mr. J. D. Enys writes me that he met with a nest of the more-pork at 
the Ohunga River, containing three eggs.* 
ScELOGLAUX ALBIFACTIES. 
From the same correspondent I learn that the nest of the laughing owl 
has been discovered in the Mackenzie country. It was placed under the 
Shelter of a boulder, and was composed of dry grass. It contained the 
broken fragments of a white egg. 
* I have a similar report from Mr. W. Fraser, junr., who found an owl’s nest in a 
oceate taining three young 
: : d 
three Somat oo — birds. The owls bred there for 
