74 THE STORY OF BIRD-LIFE. 



In Australia there are kinsmen on the way 

 towards the same doom. These are little ground- 

 parrots, whose power of flight, for reasons simi- 

 lar to those just recited, is slowly decreasing. 



There is a point which is well worth noting 

 here, concerning what we may call compensation 

 for this loss of flight, but a sadly disproportionate 

 one. To wit, in all markedly arboreal or tree- 

 haunting birds the legs are very short indeed. 

 Take the pigeons, the parrots, the cuckoos, and 

 the hornbills as instances. In all of these cer- 

 tain of their members have fallen away and lost 

 their first estate, and now walk the earth wearily 

 instead of winging their way above it as fancy 

 led them. In just so many instances have the 

 legs become conspicuously longer ; and from this 

 fact only we could tell that they were to be 

 written off" as representing the poor relatives of 

 the family — the failures and the fallen ones. 

 Many of these fly no more, the remainder but 

 indifferently. 



The wood-hen, or weka rail of New Zealand, 

 is another of these flightless forms ; its wings, 

 though moderately large, are of no use as organs 

 of flight. Yet another of these forlorn ones who 

 seem "to live, desiring witliout hope," is the 

 large gallinule or water-hen Notornis. This bird 

 is further remarkable in that it was first described 

 as an extinct fossil bird, probably flightless. 

 Years after a living specimen was captured, and 

 within the last year yet another has been 

 captured. It is probable, however, that it is 

 now almost or quite extinct. 



The dodo, the solitaire, and the great auk, 



