91 
and that the eggs are extremely large for the size of the birds, and 
are generally of a cinnamon colour.” 
44*2. Megapodius tumulus, Gould Vol. Y. PL 79. 
The following interesting account of the breeding-places of this 
remarkable bird has been transmitted to me by Mr. John M‘Gillivray 
as the result of his observations on Nogo or Megapodius Island in 
Endeavour Straits. It will be seen that its range is more extensive 
than I had assigned to it:— - 
“ The most southern locality known to me for this singular 
bird is Haggerston Island (in lat. 12° 3' south), where I observed 
several of its mounds of very large size, but did not see any of 
the birds. During the survey of Endeavour Straits in H.M.8. 
Bramble, I was more fortunate, having succeeded in procuring both 
male and female on the island marked 6 Nogo’ upon the chart, 
where 1 resided for several days for that sole purpose. On this 
small island, not more than half a mile in length, rising at one ex- 
tremity into a low rounded hill densely covered with jungle (or what 
in New South Wales would be called ‘ brush ’), three mounds, one 
of them apparently deserted before completion, were found. The two 
others were examined by Mr. Jukes and myself. The most recent, 
judging from the smoothness of its sides and the want of vegetable 
matter, was situated upon the crest of the hill, and measured 8 feet 
in height (or 13^- from the base of the slope to the summit) and 
77 feet in circumference. In this mound, after several hours’ hard 
digging into a well-packed mass of earth, stones, decaying branches 
and leaves and other vegetable matter, and the living roots of trees, 
we found numerous fragments of eggs, besides one broken egg con- 
taining a dead and putrid chick, and another whole one, which proved 
to be addled. All were imbedded at a depth of six feet from the 
nearest part of the surface, at which place the heat produced by 
the fermentation of the mass was considerable. The egg, 3^ by 2|- 
inches, was dirty brown, covered with a kind of epidermis, which 
easily chipped off, exposing a pure white surface beneath. Another 
mound, situated at the foot of the hill close to the beach, measured 
no less than 150 feet in circumference, and to form this immense 
accumulation of materials the ground in the vicinity had been 
scraped quite bare by the birds, and numerous shallow excavations 
pointed out whence the materials had been derived. Its form was 
an irregular oval, the flattened summit not being central as in the first 
instance, but situated nearer the larger end, which was elevated 14 
feet from the ground, the slope measuring in various directions 18, 
21-jp and 24 feet. At Port Lihou, in a small bay a few miles to the 
westward, at Cape York and at Port Essington, I found other 
mounds which were comparatively low, and appeared to have been 
dug into by the natives. The great size the tumuli (which are pro- 
bably the work of several generations) have attained on Haggerston 
and Nogo Islands arises doubtless from those places being seldom 
visited by the Aborigines. I found several eggs of large size in 
the ovarium of a female shot in August, while the condition of the 
