SPOTLESS CRAKE. 
Nestling. Covered with greenish-black down. 
Immature. An apparently immature bird from Tasmania is not so chocolate-brown above ; 
slightly darker underneath, with the throat uniform with the breast. Bill and iris 
black ; legs and feet light brown. 
Nest. “ Composed of dry grass, placed on the ground under the shelter of a clump of rushes 
or band-grass, in the proximity of water ” (Littler). 
Eggs. “ Clutch, four usually ; lengthened oval in shape ; texture fine ; surface glossy ; 
colour greyish-white, mottled with chestnut. Dimensions in mm. of a clutch from 
28 to 26.75 by 21.5. to 20 ” (Littler). 
Crex 'plumbea was proposed by Gray (in Griffith’s Ed. Cuvier’s Animal Kingdom, 
VIII., p. 410 (1829), for a bird of unknown habitat. The specimen upon which 
the description was based is still preserved in the British Museum, and upon 
comparison with Australian specimens it was found to differ, in that it possessed 
a longer bill and longer tarsus, and also duller upper coloration. The latter might 
be due to the age of the specimen, but upon carefully examining the series in 
the British Museum, the New Zealand specimens were found to agree very closely 
with the type, and possessed longer bills and tarsi than Australian specimens. 
An additional connecting link between the type and the New' Zealand birds 
w’’as observed in the length of the secondaries, which were almost equal to the 
primaries, whereas in the Australian form they are considerably shorter. I there- 
fore designate New Zealand as the type-locality of Gray’s Crex plumbea. In 
consequence it becomes necessary to revert to’ Swainson’s name immaculata, 
given to a Tasmanian bird, for the Australian subspecies. Here again it would 
seem that several other subspecies wall have to be recognised, but as yet I 
have not the material at hand to separate them. 
The Dark Rail of Latham (Gen. Hist. B., IX., p. 378 (1824) ) recognised by 
Gray (Aim. Mag. Nat. Hist., XL, p. 194 (1843)) as Porzana plumbea and by Sharpe 
(Hist. Coll. Nat. Hist. Brit. Mus., II., p. 149 (1906)) as Porzana tabuensis, was 
founded upon the drawmg of a bird from Norfolk Island. These references may 
be applicable to the Australian subspecies, but at present this cannot be 
decided, as no specimens from Norfolk Island are available. 
I can find no notes regarding the life-history of this bird. The bird figured 
and described is a male collected in New South Wales, in December, 1888. 
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