684 AVES— DODO. 



but this tail is disproportioned and displaced. Its legs are too short for 

 running, and its body too fat to be strong. 



This bird was a native of the Isle of France ; and the Dutch, wno nrst 

 discovered it there, called it in their language the nauseous bird, as well from 

 its disgusting figure, as from the bad taste of its flesh. However, succeed- 

 ing observers contradict this last report, and assert that its flesh is good and 

 wholesome eating. It is a simple bird, and is very easily taken. Three or 

 four dodos are enough to dine a hundred men. 



This bird, says Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, was originaLy 

 found on the uninhabited islands in the Indian ocean, and in great numbers ; 

 but from various accounts it is supposed now to have entirely disappeared. 

 The dodo, or as it is sometimes called, the solitaire, was seen in numbers; 

 by Vasco de Gama, a Portuguese navigator, in 1497, and in 1614, on the 

 islands of Bourbon and Mauritius. He speaks of them as being very tame, 

 and not at all afraid of man. 



Leguat, who visited the island of Rodriguez, in 1G91, gives a long account 

 of the solitaire. Though generally represented as a clumsy and ill-formed 

 bird, he speaks of it as graceful and dignified in its movements, and as 

 possessing great beauty. Though it would allow itself to be approached, 

 yet when caught, it was incapable of being tamed, and would refuse nourish- 

 ment till it died. The nest was made of a heap of palm leaves, raised a 

 foot and a half from the ground, in which one egg was deposited. When 

 the dodo finally disappeared from these islands is not known, but no traces 

 ha7e been found of it since the commencement of the eighteenth century. 



