66 Transactions. 



tlie Polynesian Islands, northwards to Siberia and Kamscliatka, wliere it 

 rears its young. (See Hartl. and Einsct, " OrnitL.. of Central Polynesia," 

 p. 196.) IlcEmatopus unicolor is found also in Austra,lia, according to 

 Schlegel. 



Pam. AsDEiDiE.— The white crane {Ardea flavirostris, "Wagl.) is by no 

 means restricted to New Zealand, but spreads itself over Australia as far as 

 Java and the Philippines. It is identical with A. intermedia, Yfagl., and 

 SLerodias pliimifera, dould. 



Ardea matooTc {sacra, &ml. ; jtigularis, Forst.) has a still more extended 

 range. (See " Ornith. Gent. Polyn.," p. 205.) The remarkable variety in 

 colour (white and slate-coloured), and the important difference in size, were 

 the reasons why ^the species has been described so often under various 

 names (18). 



'Botaurus poicilopterus is found also in Tasmania and Australia (19). 



Earn. ScoLOPACiDiE. — The various grades of colour in Himantopus novcs- 

 zealandicd are found in one and the same species, attributable either to age or 

 the time of year. A beautiful change of plumage in a specimen in the 

 Bremen Museum, where the white parts beneath are still mingled with 

 black feathers, leaves this beyond a doubt. 



Limosa novce-zealandioe, Grray {iiropygialis, (xould; haueri, ■Natt.),'^as 

 the eastern representative of our L. rufa, Briss. (lapponica, Linn.) It only 

 visits these southern lands on its winter wanderings, since it breeds in high 

 latitudes of Eastern Asia. (See " Ornith. Cent. Polyn.," p. 177), (20). 



Pam. Sallid^. — Concerning the existence of Notornis onantelli, Mr. D. 

 Mackay has recently contributed some very interesting details in the " Ibis," 

 1867, p. 144. The bird is still living in considerable numbers in some 

 districts on the west coast of the Middle Island of New Zealand. Those 

 parts were first explored by the miners, after the discovery of the gold fields 

 in 1865, who often lived for days together on the flesh of what they called 

 " ground parrots," or the Notornis mantelli. Since the bird is so very 

 helpless, and can be caught so easily by men and dogs, it appears certain 

 that within a short time the number will have greatly dimirdshed, if not 

 died out altogether. 



I may add, by the way, that GalUnula alba, Latham, from Norfolk 

 Island, the original specimen of which I have lately examined in the Yienna 

 Museum, belongs much more to the genus Notornis than to Porphyria, 

 as has lately been determined by Pelzeln ("Trans. Impl. Acad.," 1860, 

 p. 331), (21). 



Our knowledge of the genus Ocydromus is still very imperfect; more- 

 over, the number of its species has not yet been established with certainty, 

 particularly since we know so little of its change of plumage through age 



