of the Male Bustard. Ill 



organ. What is most remarkable in the above is his statement 

 that he had found it also present " in a female." Now there is a 

 kind of witness well known to lawyers as one who tries to prove 

 too much. In such a light Bloch seems to have been regarded 

 by Schneider, whoj in 1788, edited the Imperial work on Falconry, 

 to which I before alluded. Here he {op. cit. ii. p. 9) observes, 

 " Saccum gularem primus annotavit et pinxit in Otide vulgari 

 Edwards Britannus ; eundem deinde in mare vidit aquseque reci- 

 piendse dicavit CI. Pallas Itinerarii Russici t. iii. p. 220. Sed 

 nuper demum exstitit vir doctus. El. Bloch, qui feminse otidi 

 eundem saccum communem assereret, in Scriptis Societ. Berolin. 

 Amicorum Naturee Curios, vol. iii. p. 376. Doleo me uondum 

 potiri potuisse hac ave satis in his regionibus frequenti, sed captu 

 difficili, quo ipse oculis meis de dubitatione hac virorum docto- 

 rum decernerem. Si mas solus sacco gulari gaudet, potest turn 

 in amore eum forte inflare, ut coUum intumescat. Contra si 

 femina eundem habet, quod vix credo, alium tum eidem usum 

 excogitare debemus." I can only stop to record my admiration 

 of Schneider's cautious language. Between 1799 and 1805, 

 Cuvier (Le9ons d' Anatomic Comparee, publiees par Dumeril), 

 as quoted by Mr. Yarrell, dwelt at some length on the blood- 

 vessels, glands, and cellular tissue of the neck in birds, but he 

 does not refer to any peculiarity in the neck of the Bustard. In 

 1802, Montagu (Orn. Diet., pagg. innumm.) states that a pre- 

 paration of the pouch " may be seen in Sir Ashton Lever^s Mu- 

 seum." This celebrated collection was afterwards dispersed by 

 sale, and I have never been able to ascertain what became of the 

 specimen. It seems to me not at all impossible that it may have 

 been the original preparation of Douglas, and it will be remem- 

 bered that Barrington mentions Sir Ashton's name in connexion 

 with the subject. Montagu, by the way, through an obvious 

 slip of the pen, doubles the asserted capacity of the pouch, and 

 then proceeds to show that its size must have been somewhat 

 exaggerated. On this circumstance an anonymous writer, whom, 

 from his thorough acquaintance with the subject, added to the 

 quiet humour that he displays in its treatment, I imagine to have 

 been the late Mr. Broderip, aptly remarks (Frazer's Magazine, 

 No. 297, Sept. 1854, p. 339), that Montagu's strictures "look 



