NATATORES. 381 



Genus BIZIURA, Leach. 



A genus of which only a single species is known, and 

 which is singularly different from every other member of the 

 AimtidcB ; so different, in fact, that I question if this be its 

 natural situation ; and although, like Bonaparte, I have placed 

 it next to Erismatura, I believe its alliance to that form is 

 but a seeming one. There is something about this extra- 

 ordinary bird which reminds one of the Cormorants ; yet no 

 ornithologist would, I presume, associate it with those birds. 

 Like many other of these antipodean forms, it must be 

 regarded as an anomaly. It is, in fact, a Biziura, and 

 nothing more, for it stands alone. 



The male has a lengthened, stiff, and leather-like appen- 

 dage hanging from the under surface of the bill ; the female 

 is similarly clothed, but is not above half the size of the male, 

 and is destitute of the appendage which renders the male so 

 conspicuous. 



Sp. 595. BIZIURA LOBATA. 



MusK-DucK. 



Anas lohata, Shaw, Nat. Misc. pi. 255. 



Lohated Duck, Lath. Gen. Syn. Supp., vol. ii. p. 349. 



Biziura novce-hollandice, Steph. Cont. of Shaw's Gen. Zool., vol. xii. 



p. 222. 

 Hydrobates lobatus, Temm. PI. Col., 406. 

 Biziura lohata, Eyton, Mon. of Anat., p. 168. — Bonap. Comp. Rend. 



de I'Acad. Sc, torn, xliii., seances des 15 et 22 Sept. 1856. 

 Anas carunculata, Vieill. 2nde Edit, du Nouv. Diet. d'Hist. Nat., 



torn. v. p. 109. 

 Go-da-ra, Aborigines of Western Australia. 



Biziura lobata, Gould, Birds of Australia, fol., vol. vii. pi. 18. 



This singular species is widely and very generally dis- 

 tributed over the whole of the southern countries of Austra- 

 lia, including Tasmania and the smaller islands in Bass's 



