56 



the bird descend upon the bait, but he took himself off again before I was informed. About noon there 

 was a cry of 'The "White Hawk,' and, sure enough, there he was sailing over the lake towards his 

 dejeuner. But, at this moment, another Hawk, evidently on the same errand, arrived and, seeing each 

 other, they veered away in another direction, apparently with the object of giving each other the slip. 

 A few minutes later they both returned, only to come face to face, when there was a 'regular set-to' 

 in mid-air, right across the lake, the "White Hawk completely routing his younger rival. Presently the 

 former swooped down where we knew the bait to be. I rushed up to the house for my gun, and when 

 I came out I found a party of ten or twelve Maoris squatted on the slope intently watching, and of 

 course backing the wily Hawk. When within forty yards he heard me and was up like lightning; but 

 he was too late, and a minute afterwards the handsome bird was in my hands. Having been killed 

 with quail-shot the specimen was quite uninjured. 



From my son's account of the encounter in the air he witnessed above the placid 

 waters of Papaitonga, I concluded that his "White Hawk" was a male, and so it proved 

 on dissection, the testes being very conspicuous. 



The bird in this hoary condition of plumage is distinguished by these Maoris as " Kahu 

 korako." But the White Hawk of Maori traditions, called " Matakirea," was apparently an 

 albino. Such an example came into my hands shortly before I left the Colony. It had been 

 caught, uninjured, in a rat-trap in the Christchurch district, and I purchased it alive 

 through the kind offices of Professor Hutton, to whom it had been offered for sale to the 

 Museum, but at too high a price. In this bird the entire plumage is snow-white, except 

 that on the upper surface there are a few scattered brown feathers on the shoulders, two 

 among the small coverts of the right wing, and one or two partially brown feathers among 

 the scapulars ; also, on the under-surface, one of the axillary plumes, one of the under- 

 coverts of the left wing, and a single feather on the left thigh are brown, and there is a 

 wash of fulvous on the abdomen. The tail, however, is of the normal colour, but one of the 

 feathers is white on its inner vane. With these trifling exceptions, the entire plumage is 

 snow-white, presenting a very striking appearance. On dissection it proved to be a female, 

 and its golden irides showed that it w r as an adult bird. 



It must have been such a bird as this which the old tohunga had in his mind when he 

 narrated to Sir George G-rey, "on the rocky edge of a hot spring shaded by pohutukawa- 

 trees," on the Island of Mokoia, the story of Hinemoa, the maiden of Eotorua : — 



She rose up in the water 

 As beautiful as the wild White Hawk, 

 And stepped on the edge of the bath 

 As graceful as the shy White Crane. 



At Papaitonga, also, my son saw one with a perfectly white head, but it was very shy, 

 and he was unable to shoot it. 



I have noticed that this species hovers and hunts in the rain, without any 

 inconvenience, occasionally shaking its wet plumage. The old birds are very wary. On one 

 occasion at Papaitonga, finding that these Hawks were molesting my Sea-gulls, I shot a cat 

 and set it as a bait. The old Hawk then in the vicinity soon espied it, but he was very 

 shy, and evidently suspected treachery. When satisfied as to its nature by making a wide 

 circuit overhead, he betook himself to the top of a tree-fern hard by, and remained there 

 fully half-an-hour keeping a strict look-out. Then he swooped down upon the carrion, but on 

 finding himself stalked he took himself off and did not return till the following morning, 

 when I shot him and obtained a fine male specimen in full plumage. 



My son called my attention to a singular fact at Papaitonga. He had observed that 



