THE LITERARY 



OF THE LINN^AN ASSOCfATION OF PRNNSYLVANfA COLLEGE. 



Vol. I. MARCH, 1845. No. 5. 



THE DANGER BIRD OF NEAV ZEALAND. 



DINORNIS NOV.T. ZEALANDIiE. OWEN. 



BY PROF. FOREMAN, WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, BALTIMORE, MD. 



During the mist and obscurity of former geological Epochs, vast 

 numbers of organic forms suffered a total extinction, and therefore can- 

 not now be found living in any country on the globe. Their remains 

 which consist chiefly of the bony skeletons of the vertebrate, or shells 

 and carapaces of the invertebrate classes,, open to the inquisitive natura- 

 list a great volume full of instruction and entertainment, stereotyped in 

 stone, and illustrated by figures which nature herself has drawn. Of 

 the vegetable tribes too, the leaves, stems, fruits and forms of inflores- 

 cence of plants of entire continents, are found laid carefully down be- 

 tween leaves of sandstone or slate, and pressed into shapes of unmatch- 

 ed elegance. But of the element of llwe concerned in the fulfillment of 

 these results no calculation can be made — nor can their chronology be 

 tabulated, for, compared with the duration of man's occupation of the 

 globe, these changes have occupied a term of ages which would seem 

 to count back through all eternity. 



But we have abundant evidence to show that this process of extinc- 

 tion has not by any means ceased, for the fate of certain animals known 

 by tradition, or by the existence of their very recent remains in our 

 museums, to have lived during the historical period, fully assures us of 

 its progress at this present time. 



The loss from among the living tribes of a remarkable species of 

 bird, the Dodo, (Didus Ineptus^ Linna}us) furnishes us with a most 

 striking example. It was certainly seen alive by the Dutch navigators, 

 upwards of two hundred years ago, on the Isle of France. Landing 

 there, soon after the passage to the East Indies by way of the Cape of 

 Good Hope had been discovered, and when the island was still unin- 

 habited, they saw and killed for food numbers of this bird, whose awk- 

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