Egg, pale olive, very minutely freckled with reddish brown, and also fairly distributed with larger 

 markings, or round blotches of reddish or purplish brown. The shell is comparatively strong, finely grained and 

 polished, and might be taken for a dimunitive Black-backed Porphyrio's egg, so close is the resemblance. 

 Length, one inch three lines ; breadth, ten lines and a-half. 



The sexes are precisely alike. 



All the upper surfaces dingy olive green, with a broad stripe of blackish brown down the centre of each 

 feather, and irregular white markings, that grow more regular on the lower part of the back ; throat, chest, and 

 breast, slate grey; abdomen and thighs, greyish black barred with white; tail, dark brown, margined with light 

 brown and vandyked on the outer edge with white ; under tail coverts, white ; primaries and secondaries, brown ; 

 irides, bright red ; bill, orange red at base and dark olive green for the remainder of its length ; feet, dark olive 

 green. 



Total length, seven inches. 



Habitats : Port Denison, Wide Bay District, Richmond and Clarence Biver Districts (New South 

 Wales), Interior, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania. 



GENUS ERYTHRA. (Reichenback) 



GOULD, in his " Birds of Australia," classifies this Bail as a Porzana, under the specific of leucophrys but 

 later he determined to follow the views of Professor Beichenbach, and classify it as a distinct genus, 

 because of its peculiar markings. Only one species has been found in Australia, and that within the 

 northern tropic ; another is supposed to exist in the Indian Isles. 



ERYTHRA QITADRISTRIGATA. (Beichenbach.) 



WHITE EYEBBOWED WATEB CBAKE. Genus : Erythra. 



OT only does this Crake differ from other Bails in the marking of its plumage, but there are also distinct 

 differences of disposition. Instead of secreting itself in the densest river vegetation, it affects the roots of 

 the thick mangrove clumps that line the banks of the northern rivers, and is a fearless familiar bird, caring 

 little about intrusion, and will run up a branch to gaze at the intruder, uttering at the same time its loud 

 chattering note that sounds like " cutche, cutche." It is not unusual to hear several of these birds uttering 

 their note in chorus, each one seemingly bent on drowning the noise of the other. 



The stomach is very muscular, as it should be to digest the food they prefer — insects, such as slugs and 

 worms, leaves of water plants, and sand — which they obtain by swimming or wading. 



Prom the fact that nests containing eggs partly incubated have been found in April, it is safe to assume 

 that more than one brood is reared in the year. The nests are shallow, and made with rushes covered with fine 

 grass, or leaves of rice straw, about three inches and three-quarters in diameter, by one inch and three-eighths 

 deep. The egg is somewhat elongated in form, with the ends well rounded, the ground colour of a bright 

 clay yellow, marked with specks or dots, usually close together, and partly confluent, and blotches of reddish 

 brown. The shell is rather thin, of a fine texture, and rather lustrous. Length, one inch three lines ; breadth, 

 ten lines and a-half. 



