in giving it a specific value, adopting at the same time the distinctive names originally proposed by Mr. 

 Bartlett. In this course I am supported by the unanimous opinion of several of the best ornithologists 

 in England, to whom I have submitted specimens for examination. 



" I take this opportunity of saying that the credit of this discovery belongs to Dr. Haast, who, 

 on receiving from me a North Island bird, by comparison with the specimens in the Canterbury Museum, 

 detected this structural difference in the plumage, and informed me of it long before I had an opportunity 

 of verifying the fact for myself. 



" As a rule, the South Island birds are larger than those from the North Island, but occasionally 

 examples of Apteryx Mantelli are met with fully equal in size to the largest specimens of A. Australis, 

 and this is therefore of little or no value as a specific character. It may also be observed that in 

 this species the long facial hairs or feelers are, generally speaking, far less abundant than in the North 

 Island Apteryx. 



" Apart from the slight differences which constitute it a fresh species, this Apteryx has the 

 same habits and economy as A. Mantelli. The legs and feet are strong and powerful, the wings 

 rudimentary, and entirely concealed by the plumage. It is nocturnal in its habits, and hunts by sense 

 of touch or smell ; it is not quite determined which. It is partly insectivorous, stomachs having been 

 found to contain beetles, pebbles, and many hard kernels of the Hinau berry (Elcecarpus dentatus), 

 though its favourite food is the glowworm. 



The skin is so thick and tough that it is more like mammalion hide than a bird's skin, and 

 is quite strong enough to make shoes of. 



Incubation takes place between January and March, when the male, after the custom of all 

 struthious birds, hatches the eggs, which are very large, and quite out of proportion to the size of 

 the bird. In shape they are peculiar, being almost a long oval with a not very perceptible difference in 

 the smaller end. Roughly speaking, an egg measures five inches long by three inches broad. 



The sexes are alike in plumage, but there is a marked difference in size, the female being 

 several inches larger than the male, the total length of the male being 23 inches, that of the female 

 27 inches. 



The characteristic of the features is that they "are lanceolate, and composed externally of long 

 disunited filaments, getting downy towards the roots, the features of the back being very rigid on the 

 upper and hind parts of the body, which makes the plumage stiff and harsh to the touch. The A. 

 Australis differs from the A. Mantelli in the lighter colour of its plumage, the feathers being of a sandy 

 or greyish brown, with darker margins, those of the upper parts only slightly tinged near the tips 

 with rufous. The plumage of the nape and back of the neck is less hairy, and the feathers of the 

 back and hind parts are destitute of the lengthened and stiffened points which characterise other 

 species." 



A young specimen in the Canterbury Museum has the head dark grey, and the rest of the 

 plumage grey is! 1 brown, lighter on the underparts, each feather with a narrow streak of fulvous along 

 the shafts ; on the feathers of the upper part this streak is darker towards the tip, and the terminal 

 filaments are black, whereas in the underparts of the body both the tips and filaments are light brown 

 or fulvous ; the bill, which measures two inches in length, is light horn colour, the legs and feet are 

 light brown, the metatarsi being covered anteriorly with thin scales, scarcely definable to the eye. In 

 this young condition the quill-tubes are very minute, and the plumage of the body is extremely soft 

 to the touch." (Buller.) 



Habitat : South Island, New Zealand. (Buller.) 



