A VI FAUX A OF LAYSAN, ETC. 



211 



55. PENNULA MILLSI, Dole. 



mojio. 



? Rallus ecau dotus, King in Voy. Pacif. Ocean (Cook's last,, iii. p. Ill) (1781). 



Wingless bird on Hawaii, which the natives call Moho, now nearly extinct, Pease (not Peale!), Proc. Zool. Soc. 

 London, 1802, p. 1 15. 



Pennula millsi (errore typogr. " millei "), Dole, Hawaiian Alman. 1871), p. 54 (reprint in Ibis, 1880, p. .211) 

 (Uplands of Hawaii : named in honour of Mr. Mills, spec, in Mills's coll. : neat ly extinct) ; A. Newton, 

 P. Z. S. 1889, p. 5. 



Pennula ccaudata (?King !), Wilson & Evans, Aves Hawaiiens. pt. v. text & plate (from specimen in Cambridge) 

 (1894) ; Haiti. Abh. naturw. Ver. Bremen, xii. p. 396 (1892) ; Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxiii. p. 114 

 (1891) (descr. spec, in Mus. Rothschild— synonymia partim !) ; Hartl. Abh. naturw. Ver. Bremen, xiv. 

 p. 31 (1895) • Hartl. Beitr. z. Gesch. ausgest. Vog. 2te Ausg. ("als MS. gedruckt") p. 10 (189G). 



Description of specimen in skin in my collection :— Upperside dark chocolate-brown, a little 

 paler on the head, darkest and slightly mottled by the faint nppcarance of the almost 

 black centres of the feathers on the rump and upper tail-coverts. Wing-coverts like the 

 back. Quills blackish, the edges chocolate-brown. Rectrices blackish, with chocolate 

 brown tips. Sides of head with an ashy tinge. Underside lighter. Chin palest, 

 whitish brown. Throat and chest vinous-brown, shading off into dusky chocolate-brown 

 on the abdomen and under tail-coverts. Some of the feathers on the sides of the rump 

 with indications of rufous-buff cross-bars. Under wing-coverts dark chocolate-brown. 

 Total length about 55 inches, wing 27, tail 55, metatarsus 1*1, middle toe with claw 

 1-5, hind toe with claw 55, culmen 075. 



The second specimen in my collection is perfectly similar, except that the lateral rump- 

 feathers are all more distinctly barred with buff, and that also two of the rectrices have 

 buff variegations. None of my specimens is marked with reddish buff on the outer web 

 of the first primary, as is the Cambridge specimen. 



This bird is figured in the ' Aves Hawaiienses,' but that figure is much too reddish and too 

 light, and the barring on the lateral rump-feathers is too wide and coarse. My figure is 

 taken from the skin, and I consider it very good, exeept that the feathers of the upper- 

 side have a little too distinct lighter edges, thus giving the back a less uniform appearance 

 than it has in the specimens in my collection and in that in the Cambridge Museum 

 No other specimens are known to exist in Europe. These three form part of a series of 

 five specimens procured by an old native bird-catcher named Ilawelu, and were in the late 

 Mr. Mills's collection. The other two are in the Bishop-Pauahi Museum, in Honolulu. 



