258 PROF. OWEN ON THE ANATOMY 
gular of Birds are recorded by one of our ablest Ornithologists in the first volume of the 
Society’s Transactions. 
Mr. Yarrell at the conclusion of his excellent description expresses ‘‘a hope, that the 
zeal and liberality of the numerous friends and corresponding members of the Society 
in that part of the globe inhabited by the Apteryx directed to the attainment of this ob- 
ject will yet be successful, and enable us at some future period, perhaps not far distant, 
to supply the deficiencies which at present exist in our knowledge of the natural history 
of the Apteryx’.” This hope has been fulfilled, and the appeal made by our esteemed 
fellow-member has been satisfactorily responded to. 
The same Noble Cultivator and Patron of zoological science, to whom Ornithologists 
are indebted for the means by which the true external characteristics of the Apterya 
australis have been established, has, in the present instance, liberally contributed the 
materials on which have been founded the chief part of the present account of its inter- 
nal anatomy. 
The trunk of a male Apteryx containing the viscera, and extremely well preserved for 
anatomical investigation, was transmitted by the Earl of Derby for that purpose to the 
Zoological Society in March 1838. Some months afterwards the abdominal viscera, 
with the bones and tendons of the feet of a female Apteryz, were liberally presented to 
me by Dr. Logan, R.N., through the friendly intercession of Sir Wm. Hooker. Subse- 
quently I received the entire body of a male Apteryx, preserved in spirits, from my 
esteemed friend Mr. Geo. Bennett of Sydney, N.S. Wales, a zealous and valuable Cor- 
responding Member of the Zoological Society. These are the materials from which the 
following descriptions have been taken. 
The Apteryx presents such a singular and seemingly anomalous compound of cha- 
racters belonging to different orders of Birds. as may well make the naturalist pause 
before he ventures to pronounce against the possibility ot a like coexistence or imcon- 
gruities in the historical Dodo. It seems, as it were, to have borrowed its head from 
the Longirostral Gralla, its legs from the Galline, and its wings from the Struthious 
order. It is clothed with a plumage having the characteristic looseness of that of the 
terrestrial birds deprived of the power of flight; its feathers resemble those of the 
Emeu in the general uniformity of their size, structure, and colour, but they are more 
simple than in any of the tridactyle Struthionide, as they want the accessory plumelet’. 
The skin of the Apterya is remarkably thick and strong as compared with that of most 
other birds ; it is fully a line in thickness along the back, and gradually diminishes to 
half a line along the under part of the neck and trunk. A great quantity of fat, of the 
1 Description, &c. of the Apteryx Australis of Shaw, by W. Yarrell, F.L.S., Zool. Trans. i. p. 71. 1833. 
* Loc. cit. p. 75. 3 Pl. XLVII. fig. 5. 
