M 



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nest, one covering the other, as if to make the most of each other's society. When alarmed, 

 the male bird will invariably assume this position, as if to shield his mate from danger. This 

 domestic incident is well shown in the accompanying illustration, for which I am indebted 

 to the proprietors of the New Zealand Graphic, where it first appeared. In this instance 

 the presence of the photographer, with his camera, was the cause of the alarm. 



Order PASSERIFOKMES.] 



[Family MIJSCICAPIDJE. 



RHIPIDTIRA FULICxINOSA. 



(BLACK FANTAIL.) 



Rhipidura fuliginosa (Sparrm.), Buller, Birds of New Zealand, vol. i., p. 72. 



It is interesting to note that this Southern species is by degrees becoming an 

 inhabitant of the North Island. I have previously recorded the known instances of its 

 occurrence in the Wellington district. Of late years one has almost constantly frequented 

 my garden on the Terrace at Wellington. 



At Papaitonga I was much pleased to see one of these birds, in fine condition, in a 

 clump of native bush near the homestead. It was associating with the Pied Fantail, 

 which is particularly numerous in that locality. It was appreciably larger in size, and was 

 in beautiful plumage, the white ear-spots being very conspicuous. 



Mr. J. C. McLean, of Gisborne, in the ' Ibis ' for January, 1894, gives an interesting 

 account of the interbreeding in that district of a female bird of this species with a male of 

 Rhipidura flabellifera. There were two eggs in the nest taken, and Mr. McLean thinks they 

 are richer in colour than the ordinary egg of the Pied Fantail, "the spots being of a purplish 

 tint, while in the eggs of the pied bird they are brownish." 



At Half-moon Bay (Stewart Island) I saw a Black Fantail paired with a Pied Fantail 

 the former looking, as it moved about among the twigs on the roadside, half as large 

 again as its mate. Rhipidura flabellifera is the common species on the island, there being 

 only stray individuals of the black form. 



I received an example (in spirits) from the Snares. 



In a large collection of birds from the Chatham Islands received in England there 

 were many specimens of R. flabellifera, but none of this species. 



Mr. A. Hamilton obtained a specimen in the Pohue Bush, about twenty miles north 

 of Napier; and at a later date two or three in the Horokiwi District, near Wellington. 



i On two occasions, on my last visit to the Buller Valley, I saw a Black Fantail paired 

 with the other species. Mr. Potts has recorded several instances of this kind (see vol. i., 

 p. 73). But, as Captain Hutton has reminded me, there is no record yet of the bird in 

 hybrid plumage. 



Mr. Potts records, in the ' Zoologist,' that during many weeks of autumn one of these 

 birds entered the rooms freely, and often alighted on persons, or on a newspaper whilst 



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