26 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
genus Porphyrto (a good flier). All these points indicate 
an approach to Ratite characteristics. 
The loss of the power of flight in a member of the 
Rallide does not appear so extraordinary as in the case of 
some other birds, when we call to mind the skulking 
habits of most members of the family, and how they 
habitually trust, for security from their enemies, much 
more to the concealment which their haunts afford than 
to their powers of flight. We know how difficult it is to 
flush a Water-rail or a Corncrake from its cover, and it is 
not difficult to understand how the comparative disuse of 
the wings, which these birds exemplify, might, under 
favourable circumstances, be carried still further, until 
loss of flight became permanently established. 
As a matter of fact, taking extinct and recent forms 
together, flightless species amongst the rails are compara- 
tively common. 
One final example let me bring under your notice. Here 
is a figure of Stringops habroptilus, the Owl-Parrot of New 
Lealand, so-called because its face with its peculiar disk 
causes it to present a superficial likeness to an Owl, whilst 
in all essential characteristics of structure it is a true 
Parrot. This bird was formerly very abundant in many of 
the wooded hills of New Zealand, but, like other members 
of this group, it is rapidly vanishing in presence of the 
new forms of enemies, such as wild dogs and cats, which 
civilization has carried in its train. It lives in holes under 
roots of trees and rocks, and is strictly nocturnal in its 
habits, lying concealed all day in its burrows and only 
coming out at night to feed. It is a vegetable feeder, sub- 
sisting on mosses, grasses, and ferns, the leaves and tender 
shoots of various plants and also berries. It is more or 
less gregarious in its habits, and in places where it was 
formerly abundant, well marked tracks could be seen on 
