890 SiOLTLAT Ture. 
result that 85 more specimens were obtained in the following year 
(Proc. Zool. Soc. 1865, pp. 715-718). Moreover, the British Associa- 
tion was induced by Mr. Sclater to supply Sir Edward with the 
means of more extended exploration, and this, carried on by Mr. 
Jenner’s orders, under the supervision of Sergeant Morris, pro- 
duced nearly 2000 examples, which were in due time described 
and figured (Phil. Trans. 1869, pp. 327-362, pls. xv.-xxiv.) That 
the results obtained were important needs hardly to be said, but in 
nothing were they more striking than in the testimony they bore 
to the truth of Leguat’s account of the bird, even in parts which 
had been thought too extraordinary for belief :—the rugosity at the 
base of the bill indicated a caruncular ridge that he likened to “a 
widow’s peak” and represented in his figure: the curved outline 
of the pelvis is in accordance with the bird’s “hind part” being 
“rounded like the crupper of a horse”: the long neck and legs 
could not fail to produce “their fine mien” and the “stateliness 
and good grace” with which they walked: but, more unexpected 
than anything else was the “little round mass” of bone on the 
wing “as big as a musket ball”—largely developed in the males 
and forming a formidable weapon in the combats which took place 
among rivals. All this, together with the difference of the sexes in 
size which, though not positively stated, may be inferred from his 
words, was just as he had said; and the variability of colour he had 
noticed in the females—“ some fair, some brown ”’—was paralleled 
by the marvellous variability displayed by almost every bone of the 
skeleton. Mr. Jenner was good enough to continue his services, 
and at least as many more specimens were obtained from the caves 
in 1871. On the occasion of the Transit of Venus Expedition to 
Rodriguez in 1874, Mr. H. H. Slater was commissioned by the 
Royal Society to renew the exploration, and brought back a 
collection as large as his predecessors had obtained, which to- 
gether with the second acquisition of Mr. Jenner was dealt with 
by Sir E. Newton and Mr. J. W. Clark (Phil. Trans. elxviii. pp. 
448-451), while in 1875 the late Mr. J. Caldwell visited the 
island (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1875, pp. 644-647) and excavated for him- 
self not only at least two complete skeletons (since unhappily lost) 
but also found associated with them 3 or 4 examples of the 
stone which Leguat had said the bird always bore in its gizzard 
(op. cit. 1878, p. 291) and thus crowned the work of establishing 
his veracity. 
Notwithstanding Leguat’s description and the fact that we know 
1 This sexual inequality was first recognized by Sir E. Newton; but not 
until it had misled Mr. Bartlett (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1851, pp. 280-284, pl. xlv.), 
Strickland (7’rans. Zool. Soc. iv. pp. 187-196, pl. 55) and myself. Even after my 
brother had shewn it, Sir R. Owen fell into the same error, which he subse- 
quently but tacitly acknowledged (Ann. Nat. Hist. ser. 5, i. p. 94). 
