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eggs hatched in my desk where I had put them and almost forgotten them ; but a freshly laid egg would 

 require more attention. 



The Malau roosts in a tree and not on the ground, as might have been supposed, and generally not more 

 than one in a tree. I think the bird lives entirely on small animal and insect life. Their eyes are of a 

 lightish brown with a dark centre. They are difficult birds to keep in captivity. I have tried both adult 

 birds and also the young. I have fed them on cockroaches and termites (white ants) but have never managed 

 to keep them for more than about six weeks. The Malau runs fast and also takes short nights of from fifteen 

 to twenty yards, but never rising more than two or three feet from the ground. The way I manage to take 

 them alive as a rule is this : I get together a host of native youngsters and run the bird down. The Malau 

 does not fly except for short distances, and then, as already stated, only close to the ground. I have given you 

 all the information I possess about the bird, and I do not think that any white man can give you more 

 personal information than myself ; for I believe I am the only one who, without native help, has discovered 

 the nest and taken the eggs. It is no use to rely upon information derived from the natives, especially where 

 they are anxious to appear to know everything. They have, further, that wretched fault of trying to say 

 anything that the}^ think will please you. 



Dr. Friedlander spent three weeks here in 1897, and was unable to procure a single specimen of the 

 adult Malau, and only one nestling. 



I have not sent any specimens to Europe, and I shall not do so, as I consider that you have a prior 

 claim. Now that I possess your beautiful work on the ' Birds of New Zealand,' and have been able to make 

 a study of the subject, I look forward to much pleasure and profit when I get back to my old haunts in the 

 Colony by having, as it were, the beauties of the scene pointed out to me. 



Of the birds sent to you I procured as many as I could alive, so as to have the specimens uninjured, 

 capturing some when they had entered their holes to lay. In new places the eggs may be found a foot 

 or more below the surface, but the older holes are much deeper. I have myself found from one to as many 

 as fifteen eggs in one hole, and I have heard of even more being sometimes found. Of the nestlings sent 

 some were taken from the holes, just after quitting the eggshell, and one of them was hatched out in my desk 

 where I had placed some of the eggs for convenience. 



One of those sent was in a hole, where it had gone to lay its egg, and I put it into the tank with the egg 

 still inside it. The birds dig or burrow in the sand to a depth of four feet, or more, then lay their egg and 

 replace the sand. I am unable to determine the sexes, but I hope there may be specimens of both male and 

 female. They are precisely alike in outward appearance, and the sex can only be satisfactorily determined by 

 dissection. 



Curiously enough, from the Kermadec Islands (as I shall mention further on) I received a 

 pair of the small Swamp Crake (Porzana plumbea) and also a specimen from the Island of Nuia- 

 foou, shewing how persistent this form also is in its local distribution, although in reality, like 

 the Megapode, a very weak-winged bird. 



Of course it will be noticed that the Nuiafoou Megapode is not a mound-builder, and, 

 according to Mr. Johnson's account, the species formerly inhabiting Sunday Island formed mounds 

 of sand and decaying leaves two or three feet high ; but, if the latter observation was accurate, it 

 may have been due to circumstances of locality and environment, and by no means negatives the 

 assumption of these birds being of one and the same species. 



One of the chicks in my collection was the gift of Mr. James Mills, the General Manager of 

 the Union Steamship Company. When on a visit to the Tonga group, someone gave him a 

 Megapode's egg, and it was hatched out in his cabin during the voyage to New Zealand. It did 

 not long survive its birth at sea ; and, on reaching Auckland, Mr. Mills advised me of it by 

 telegraph, and the specimen reached me at Wellington in perfectly fresh condition. This is the 

 example figured in the plate, looking very like a small Tinamou. 



The eggs of this Megapode are very elliptical in shape, an average one measuring 3'20 in. 

 in length by 1*75 in. in breadth. They vary somewhat in size as well as in colour. They are 

 usually of a warm cream colour ; but the specimens in my possession vary from yellowish- white 

 to a rich cream colour, whilst one or two are of an uniform pale yellowish-brown. 



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