y DIDIDAE 320 
The huge blackish bill terminated in a large horny hook, the 
cheeks were partly bare, the short yellow legs were stout, scaly, and 
feathered on the upper portion; the plumage was dark ash-coloured, 
with whitish breast and tail, yellowish-white wings, and black 
tips to their coverts. The short rectrices formed a curled tuft, 
and the first four primaries were directed backwards. 
This uncouth and unwieldy species, of which a full account 
will be found in the works mentioned below,’ which have been 
largely utilized here, was noticed as early as 1598 by the Dutch, 
Fig. 66.—Dodo. Didus ineptus. (After Savery’s Vienna picture.) 
who called it Walghvogel, or Nauseous Bird, from their dislike of 
its flesh, and the island, where it was then found abundantly, 
Mauritius. The earliest representation was given in 1601 by 
De Bry, who stated that an example was brought alive to Holland. 
Other Dutch fleets subsequently visited the island, and several 
sketches of the Dodo were made, while one of the captains records 
that it was indifferently called Dodaars or Dronte. Loelandt 
Savery of Courtrai (1576-1639) painted the Dodo—probably 
from life—more than once, pictures by him still existing in 
1 Strickland and Melville, Zhe Dodo and its Kindred, London, 1848; A. 
Newton, Dict. Birds, 1898, pp. 155-161, 215, 216; E. Newton and H. Gadow, 7’. 
Zool. Soc. London, xiii. 1893, pp. 281-302. 
