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THE GENUS AFTEBYX. 



BY THE HON. WALTER ROTHSCHILD, PH.D. 

 WITH A CHAPTER ON THE ANATOMY OP THE KIWIS BY FRANK BEDDAUD. 



(Plates IX. to XVI.) 



THE genns Apteryx, forming the family Apterygidae, is now generall.v admitted 

 to represent an order or snborder {Aptcnjges or Apteryyi/ormes) of the 

 Ratitae. The position among the latter has been generally recognised from the 

 time of the earliest knowledge of the Apterijx. In 1813 Shaw said that these 

 birds seemed "to approach more nearly to the strathions and galliuaceons tribes 

 than to any other." Lesson finally placed Apitenjx among his "Oiseanx Anomanx," 

 which correspond with our Rntifae, declaring that it would doubtless have a 

 sternum without a keel. Latham ^Gen. Hist. B. v. X. p. 394) called it an 

 " Apterous Penguin," and this grave error of judgment was iendoraed by Stephens 

 (in Shaw's Gen. Zool. v. XIII. p. ~0), while Temminck placed it along with the 

 Dodo in his order Imrtes. The peculiar features of the Apteryx have been very 

 differently valued, but not many serious donbts have ever been raised as to the 

 fact. that the Aptcryges belong to the Ratitae. Nevertheless Fiirbringer (Unters. 

 zur Morphologie u. Syst. (I. Vog. v. II. p. 156", 1888) places the Kiwis, together 

 with the Crypturiformes and Galliformes, in his order Alectorornithes, dividing his 

 Oens Apteri/ges into the families Apterygidae aud Dinornithidae. Many important 

 anatomical details (see among others Parker's observations) show a striking 

 similarity with the Carinatae rather than with the Ratitae, especially the structure 

 of the foot. If the structure of the eggshell is admitted as of any taxonomic 

 value, then the Kiwis have nothing to do with any of the other Ratitae, but approach 

 the Grallae or Grallifonnes. This is easily seen when examining an Apteryx-egg 

 macroscopically, aud admitted by everybody {cf. Huttou 1871, Des Murs, Schalow 

 1894) ; and also Nathusius' microscopical studies on the eggs of Apteryx led to the 

 same conclusion. 



Notwithstanding these facts, most recent authorities (cf. Gadow, Newton, 

 Sharpe, Salvadori and others) have placed the Kiwis in the system as an order 

 or snborder of the Ratitae, and this may therefore for the present be accepted, 

 tliough not without reserve. In view of the important peculiarities of these birds — 

 chiefly the extraordinary position of the nostrils, almost on the tip of the beak, 

 the absence of an aftershaft to the feathers, the presence of four well-developed 

 toes, and the prodigiously large, thin-shelled egg — it is certainly impossible to 

 place them merely as a genus along with the Ostriches, Nandus aud Cassowaries, 

 especially since it is now universally admitted that the above-named three groups 

 are very distinct families and even orders — Strift/iiones with the genus Struthio, 

 Rheae with the genus Rhea, Casiiarii with the genera Dromaeus and Casuarii/s 

 (cf. Cat. B. Brit. Miis. v. XXVII. pp. .571-90). 



