13 



hue. Lastly, the neck circlet of white and the white spot on each side of the vent are absent 

 in the young male. 



As far back as 1885 I made the following entry in my note-book : 



" It seems pretty clear that the little Brown Teal is a species quite distinct from Anas 

 chlorotis, and that it has hitherto been confounded with that bird, because both sexes, which are 

 alike in plumage, resemble very much the female of Anas chlorotis. This conclusion was origi- 

 nally forced upon me when I examined the collection of birds formed by Dr. (now Sir James) 

 Hector, on the west coast of Otago, and exhibited by the Provincial Government at the New 

 Zealand Exhibition of 1865. But doubts were afterwards thrown upon the subject, and I did not 

 venture to characterise the species as new. My attention was called to the matter again years 

 afterwards by Mr. Beischek, who had brought a pair with him from Dusky Bay, and assured me that 

 he had carefully determined their sex, by dissection, as male and female. Yesterday (April 23rd) 

 I purchased a pair exposed for sale in a poulterer's shop in Wellington. On dissection they 

 proved to be male and female. The male measured : length, 19'5 ; extent of wings, 27*5. The 

 female measured : length, 17*75 ; extent of wings, 25'75. There is just the doubt whether the 

 sexes may not be exactly the same in the young of Anas chlorotis ; but, as against the supposi- 

 tion of these being immature birds, is the fact that I found the skin so tough and so firmly 

 attached to the body that I had some difficulty in getting it off." Later on, I find an entry of 

 another specimen which came into my hands as a skin, and yielded the following measurements : 

 length, 18*25 inches ; wing from flexure, 7*5 ; tail, 3'5 ; bill, along the ridge, 1'5, along the 

 edge of lower mandible, 1*75 ; tarsus, 1*5 ; middle toe and claw, 2. 



In the ' Birds of New Zealand' all I ventured to do was to mention this Duck as " an appa- 

 rently smaller form " of Elasmonetta chlorotis (vol. ii., p. 258, note). Although it is pretty clear 

 that the birds are distinct, I am still unwilling to set up a new species till I have obtained 

 absolute proof. 



Years ago there were hundreds of acres of ' kahikatea swamp ' in the Manawatu district, the 

 ground covered with creeping clumps of kiekie {Freycinetia banksii) — with pools of stagnant water 

 between — a favourite resort of this Duck, whose only enemy in these dark labyrinths was the 

 Maori snarer, who, from long experience, knew exactly where to lay his flax springes. In con- 

 nection with this an amusing episode occurs to my recollection. In 1871-2, with the progress of 

 settlement, railways were being constructed all through the country, and a new line, extending from 

 Foxton to Palmerston North, passed right across one of these 'kahikatea' swamps. The Maoris, 

 who had enjoyed a monopoly of the Duck snares there for years, made a grievance of this, 

 alleging that their vocation was practically gone. The Native Besident Magistrate, in his 

 anxiety to meet the prejudices of all concerned and to avoid friction, advised the Government to 

 appoint a Boyal Commission to enquire into the merits of the claim and to make an award ; and 

 a highly respectable local resident — a well-known philo-Maori — was selected to act as Boyal 

 Commissioner. Being in practice as a Barrister at the time, I happened to be retained to 

 conduct the case for the native owners of the land, who had claimed a large sum for what was 

 technically termed * damages by severance ' ; and, as the Commissioner spoke Maori fluently and all 

 those interested in the claim were Maoris, I was allowed to conduct my case in their language. I 

 well remember how amused the Maori audience was as I pictured the alarm among the unso- 

 phisticated Tetewhero (Brown Duck) at the invasion of their kiekie-domain by the ' iron horse ' 

 — how their haunts, no longer secluded and tenable, were by degrees abandoned, to the sore 

 detriment of the Maori fowler — how, in short, the march of civilisation was ruining everything ! 

 Nor shall I ever forget their delight when the Boyal Commissioner, whose Maori sympathies 

 were touched by this Maori appeal — to the horror of the Native Besident Magistrate, who was 

 sitting beside him — awarded to the aggrieved claimants the whole amount asked for, with costs 

 in addition ! 



