Its nest, which is formed of sticks and of a large size, is usually placed near the top of the largest gum-trees. The eggs, which are three or four in number, are very long in form, and of a pale dull green colour, blotched, spotted and freckled all over with umber-brown, the blotches being of a much greater size at the larger end; they are about one inch and three-quarters long by one inch and an eighth broad. The whole of the plumage rich shining purplish black, with the exception of the elongated feathers on the throat, which are slightly glossed with green; bill and feet black; irides in some white, in others brown. The Plate represents a male, killed in Van Diemen’s Land, of the natural size. [Illustration: NEOMORPHA GOULDII: _G. R. Gray_. _J. & E. Gould del et lith._ _C. Hullmandel Imp._ ] NEOMORPHA GOULDII, _G. R. Gray_. Gould’s Neomorpha. _Neomorpha acutirostris_, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part IV. p. 144.—Ib. Syn. Birds of Australia, Part I. —— _crassirostris_, Gould in Ib., p. 145.—Ib. in Syn. Birds of Australia, Part I. —— _Gouldii_, G. R. Gray, List of Gen. of Birds, p. 12. _E llia_, Aborigines of New Zealand. Two specimens of this highly curious and anomalous bird, male and female, wanting the legs and wings, which form part of the collection of the Zoological Society of London, were described by me in 1836, when, from the great difference in the form and length of their bills, I very naturally concluded that they constituted two distinct species, many genera even having been founded upon more trivial differences of character. Mr. George Robert Gray, however, entertained a different opinion from myself, and, while engaged upon his valuable little work entitled “A List of the Genera of Birds,” conceiving they were sexes of the same species, and that consequently both my names were inappropriate, inasmuch as, if either were retained, it might lead to some misconception, has been pleased to dedicate it to myself, a compliment which I duly appreciate; and I have only to hope that this change of the specific name may not be productive of any confusion on the subject.