The author knew perfectly well what he was doing when he described this
excellent species. Sir Walter Buller afterwards (B. New Zealand, Ed. I, pp.
179, 180) declared "after carefully comparing it with the type of _Rallus
dieffenbachii_, and submitting the matter to the judgment of other
competent ornithologists, I have no hesitation in considering it the same
species, in an immature state of plumage." (_Sic!_) Unfortunately, Dr.
Sharpe, in the Catalogue of Birds XXIII, repeated Buller's error, and, on
Plate VI, figured _Cabalus modestus_ under the name of _Cabalus
dieffenbachii_, though the latter is not congeneric with _C. modestus_, and
must be called _Nesolimnas dieffenbachii_, while the third form included in
_Cabalus_ by Dr. Sharpe, viz. _sylvestris_ of Lord Howe's Island, must also
be separated genetically from _Cabalus_.
Formerly _Cabalus modestus_ inhabited Great Chatham Island, as Dr. Forbes
proved by bones found by himself at Warekauri, but when the species was
discovered it existed there no more, though being plentiful on the little
outlying island of Mangare. Unfortunately even there it is evidently
extinct now, this island being overrun with cats and rats, besides which,
according to Buller, the original vegetation has been ruthlessly burnt down
for the purpose of sowing grass-seed, as even this bleak little island has
been claimed by an enterprising sheep-farmer. Fortunately a good many
specimens have been secured by the late W. Hawkins. I have fifteen in my
museum, and there are specimens in the British Museum, in Liverpool, and
one in Cambridge. Henry Palmer failed to get specimens when he visited
Mangare.
I have also the egg described and figured in the Ibis by Dr. Forbes. It
measures 40 by 21.4 mm., and is creamy white, with faint pale reddish and
purplish roundish spots.
Habitat: Chatham Islands, east of New Zealand.
{129}