THE NORWICH MUSEUM. 87 



The latest addition of all is an Australian Hieracidea orientalis, 

 from Mr. R. J. Ussher, which is worth alluding to because it is 

 said to have been shot at Dunmore, Co. Waterford, last March. 

 If so, it was probably brought over by sailors and escaped. 

 Hieracidea — which partakes of the nature of a Falcon and a 

 Buzzard, having the beak of the former and the legs of the latter 

 — has been sometimes kept in confinement at the Regent's Park 

 Gardens. 



The Nocturnal Birds of Prey. — The Owls, noiseless in 

 flight and keen of sight, as Mr. Southwell says, having eyes 

 peculiarly adapted to their nocturnal habits, are located upstairs, 

 and are reached by a staircase leading from the entrance to the 

 Skin Cabinets. As the eye wanders along the shelves, one of 

 the first to attract notice is the beautifully pencilled and mottled 

 Pseudoptynx gurneyi (Tweed dale), in which the colours of brown 

 and grey blend like the tints upon an old forest tree. The genus 

 Pseudoptynx, Kaup, was adopted by my father for three species, 

 to which a fourth has since been added, viz. the recently 

 described P. doerriesi. P. blakistoni and P. doerriesi are asso- 

 ciated with the name of the late Henry Seebohm, the latter, indeed, 

 being the last species which that active and ardent ornithologist 

 lived to describe. Our handsome specimen of P. blakistoni, a 

 male in the second year, was taken in the island of Yesso. 

 Beside it stands a skeleton of a bird from the same nest, which 

 afterwards died at the Zoological Society's Gardens. 



The next to claim attention is the noble African genus Scoto- 

 pelia, and of Scotopelia peli the Museum is fortunate in having 

 two examples, one from Dr. Livingstone, and one from Colonel 

 O'Connor. The latter specimen of this bird was brought to 

 England alive, and lived for a long time in a cage in my father's 

 garden, where it twice sat for its portrait by Wolf, whose skill is 

 especially shown in his delineation of raptorial birds. The type 

 of Ussher's Owl stands on a table in the centre of the room, with 

 the large Huhua shelleyi, presented by Dr. Sharpe, and other 

 rarities under shades, e. g. Sceloglaux albifacies, from New Zealand, 

 brought home in 1895 by Sir Francis Boileau, of which there is 

 another specimen in the gallery. Two examples of the Mada- 

 gascar Bay Owl, Heliodilus soumagnei, procured by Mr. J. Wills, 

 and the Sooty Owls of New Guinea and Australia, complete this 

 series. Among additions made since my father's death, special 



