Page:Transactions and proceedings of the New Zealand Institute (IA transactionsproc61873newz).pdf/180

116 Miro longipes, Garn.

Miro albifrons, Gml.

Dr. Finsch kindly wrote to me last year, pointing out that these birds were not true Petroicæ, and proposed restoring them to Reichenbach's genus Myioscopus. Upon investigation I found that the genus Miro, of Lesson, had an older claim to recognition, and I accordingly substituted that for Petroica.

I cannot understand how Dr, Finsch could confound the two species as being "scarcely distinct." Tt is true that they are closely allied, but they are nevertheless so different in appearance that one specimen of P. longipes could be readily picked out of a hundred or more of P. albifrons, and vice versâ. The former species is confined strictly to the North Island, and the latter to the South Island.

The habits of these birds, it may be remarked, approaches very nearly to those of the true Erythaci.

Myiomoira toitoi, Less.

T have adopted Dr, Finsch's example in referring this and the allied species (M. macrocephala) to the genus defined by Reichenbach, to which they clearly belong.

Sphenæacus rufescens, Buller.

I am much surprised to find Dr. Finsch confounding this very distinct species with Gray's Sphenæacus fulvus. S. fulvus closely resembles S. punctatus, so much so in fact that I was for some time in doubt whether to keep them separate or not; and the coloured figures of S. punctatus and S. rufescens, facing page 128 of my "Birds of Now Zealand," will satisfy the student, at a glance, that these are very distinct species.

The specimens in the Canterbury Museum first decided me to retain S. fulvus, at least provisionally, and Capt. Hutton, from an independent examination of the same specimens, appears to have arrived at a similar conclusion. (Cat. Birds of N.Z., p. 9.)

The type of Sphenæacus fulvus is still in the British Museum. In company with Mr. G. R. Gray, who originally distinguished the species, I made a careful comparison of it with specimens of Sphenæacus punctatus, and ultimately admitted it into my work, but without attempting to figure it. I still look upon it as a doubtful species, and had Dr. Finsch proposed uniting this form {instead of S. rufescens) to S. punctatus, there would have been some show of reason for it.

Creadion carunculatus, Gml.

It was not the "examination of the types by Capt. Hutton" that proved my C. cinereus to be the young of this species, but the examination by myself