23 
was not so glossy, and the wattles not so large or bright. In the adult male these ornamental 
appendages are of a beautiful orange colour, and in the adult female a little lighter. In the young 
birds they are still lighter and extremely minute. 
Io place the matter, however, beyond all doubt, he found, on the occasion of his last visit (on 
the 14th lebruary), two adult birds feeding a young one, and was successful enough to secure 
all three birds, which he carefully preserved and marked . He was loth to part with these speci- 
mens ; hut, to enable me to demonstrate the specific value of Creadion cinereus, he handed all 
three birds over to me (marked respectively male, female, and young), and they are now in my 
collection. 
In 1859 I found this species very abundant in the woods on Banks’ Peninsula; but it has long 
since disappeared before the advancing tide of European settlement. It is still, however, compara- 
tively plentiful on the western and south-western portions of the South Island. 
Its habits are precisely similar to those of Creadion carunculatus , already described; and its 
mode of reproduction is the same *. 
It has become the habit to speak of this bird as the Brown Saddle-hack ; but this is a misnomer, 
inasmuch as the absence of the “ saddle ” is its distinguishing feature. I have accordingly adopted 
the name of Jack-bird, by which it is known among the settlers in the South Island. Why it 
should be so called I cannot say, unless this is an adaptation of the native name “ Tieke,” the same 
word being the equivalent, in the Maori vernacular, of our “ Jack. 
That the two species occasionally interbreed is, 1 think, sufficiently evident from the specimens 
in so-called transitional plumage, in the Canterbury Museum, already specially mentioned. This is 
known to occur pretty often with the two allied species of Fan-tailed Flycatcher (Rhipidura flabellifera 
and R. fuliginosa ) in the South Island, and, as there is every reason to believe, likewise in the case of 
our two species of Oyster-catcher, in both islands. 
Under the head of Sturnidse, Mr. G. K. Gray, in his ‘ List of the Birds of New Zealand,’ 
published in 1862, included the genus Aplonis, with two species, A. zealandicus and A. obscurus. 
In my former edition, I omitted these birds altogether, as I had been unable to obtain any satisfactory 
evidence of their occurrence in New Zealand. In my ‘Manual of the Birds of New Zealand’ 
(published in 1S82) I admitted Aplonis zealandicus on the authority of Dr. Finsch, who wrote: — 
This is an excellent and typical species, which I had the pleasure of seeing in the Leiden Museum, 
being one of the typical specimens brought home by the ‘Astrolabe’ Expedition. Dr. Hartlaub 
informs me that there are three specimens in the Museum in Paris, all marked ‘ Tasman’s Bay, New 
Zealand, and collected by the French travellers.” Further investigation, however, has satisfied me 
that it has no claim whatever to a place in the New-Zealand avifauna. 
Last year I visited the Museum of the Jardin des Plantes in Paris for the express purpose of 
examining the type specimens referred to by Dr. Finsch ; and, through the courtesy of Dr. Oustalet, 
the officer in charge of the Ornithological department, I had an opportunity of thoroughly investi- 
gating the subject. 
'* “For its resting-place a hollow or decayed tree is usually selected; sometimes the top of a tree-fern is preferred, We 
found a nest in a dead tree-fern not far from Lake Mapourika, Westland. This was of slight construction, built principally of 
fern-roots, deeply woven into rather a deep-shaped nest with thin walls ; for as the structure just filled the hollow top of the 
tree-fern, thick walls were unnecessary. Another nest, in a small-sized decayed tree in the Okarita bush, was in a holt not 
more than three feet from the ground. It was roughly constructed, principally of fibres and midribs of decayed leaves of the 
kiekie, with a few tufts of moss, leaves of rirnu, lined with moss and down of tree-ferns ; and it measured across, fiom outside 
to outside of wall, 1 2 inches 6 lines, cavity 3 inches diameter, depth of cavity 2 inches. The egg, measuring nearly 1 inch 4 linos 
through the axis with a breadth of ll| lines, sprinkled over with faint purplish marks, towards the broad end brownish purple, 
almost forming one large blotch.” — Out in the Open, p. 202. 
