3420 Birds. 



the box of the Apteryx, which showed that he was on the move, 

 and for some time I continued to hear snaps of the beak, from which 

 I concluded that he might be preening his feathers, an operation I 

 have never been so fortunate as to see him perform, but for the facili- 

 tating of which he is described as being, like other birds, provided 

 with an oil-gland. Presently he put his head under the curtain and 

 stepped out, feeling his way, or smelling it, with his beak. He advan- 

 ced towards the front in the dim light, his body rather rounded, his 

 hind quarters reminding one of a bear's in contour, his head lower 

 than his back, and his beak dotting about from spot to spot, actually 

 touching the ground, as was perceived plainly enough by the tap when 

 he was on wood; and scenting also, as was inferred from the slight 

 delay on each point, and from the little sniffle which often followed it, 

 apparently to clear away any dust which might have got into the nos- 

 trils. Not unfrequently he walked about without any of this investi- 

 gation, the point of the beak however being seldom raised far above 

 the ground ; I have never seen him use his beak as an assistance to 

 progression, at any time. 



Once or twice he shook himself, but not in a remarkably vigorous 

 manner, as his development of cutaneous muscles might have enabled 

 him to do. Several times he scratched his chin smartly with the claws 

 of one foot. He was not long before he paid a visit to the heap. He 

 inserted his beak into the flower-pot and ate a worm, but then imme- 

 diately began to examine the soil in preference to adopting so lazy a 

 mode of getting his breakfast, for that there still were worms in the 

 pot was proved by his presently returning to it and eating another or 

 two, although they might not be such healthy and well-seasoned ones 

 as he procured elsewhere. I was much pleased to find that I could 

 turn the full light of the bull's eye upon him without disturbing him, 

 so that I was able to see his movements sufficiently distinctly. 



Standing with one foot a little in advance of the other, and holding 

 his beak in a more or less slanting, or again in a nearly upright posi- 

 tion, he pushed it into the ground by a succession of four or five shoves, 

 following one another at intervals of something less than a second of 

 time, each of them accompanied by a slight sound just audible to me, 

 but whether caused by the friction of the beak against the soil or by 

 a sniff underneath it, I cannot say with certainty. In this act the 

 whole body, head, and neck, moved together, the feet appearing to be 

 the pivot on which all turned, and there was not any drawing back to 

 get an impetus for each new shove. At last, withdrawing his beak, 

 he was heard to swallow a worm with the usual snaps, or, if unsuc- 





