32 Shufeldt, Anatomy of the Passenger Pigeon. [jan. 



gether, while the right lobe of the liver was in scattered fragments. 

 The firmer organs were apparently intact, but did not occupy their 

 normal positions. This left but one course for me to adopt. I 

 therefore evacuated the blood, washed out the abdominal cavity 

 carefully, and consigned the entire body to a jar containing fresh, 

 denatured alcohol, which I had purchased for the purpose. 



My hope was to have made a dissection, to be photographed 

 similar to my colored plate of a female tame pigeon, which forms 

 the frontispiece to the Key to North American Birds by Dr. Elliott 

 Coues (Revised Edition, 1884), or to my dissection of the young of 

 Phalacrocorax atriceps georgianus (PI. 18, Fig. 6), where, in either 

 case, all the viscera are displayed and duly lettered. 1 



The colored pigeon plate I refer to should prove helpful to one 

 not especially familiar with the organs and other structures in the 

 ColumbidoE while reading the anatomical part of the present paper. 

 There is an interesting contribution to the anatomy of Ectopistes 

 migratorius in Audubon's "Birds of America," for which we have 

 to thank the learned Scotch naturalist, William MacGillivray. 2 



This description is devoted almost entirely to the organs and 

 structures included in the digestive system and to the anatomy of 

 certain parts of the air passages. Up to the present time there has 

 been nothing — so far as I am aware — contributed to the myology 

 of the Passenger Pigeon, or to certain other parts of its morphology, 

 while recently I have given a brief, illustrated account of its skele- 

 ton. 3 



The Brain: As stated above, Mr. Palmer removed the brain as 

 best he could, after skinning the head of the bird, and it was at 

 once consigned to alcohol. 



1 Shufeldt, R. W. "Anatomical Notes on the young of Phalacrocorax atri- 

 ceps georgianus." Science Bulletin, Vol. 2, No. 4. The Museum of the Brooklyn 

 Institute of Arts and Sciences, "A Report of the South Georgia Expedition." 

 Edited by Robert Cushman Murphy. (Nov. 5, 1914), pp. 95-101. Pis. 17, 18. 



2 Audubon, John James. "The Birds of America from Drawings made in the 

 United States and their Territories." Vol. V, New York, 1839, pp. 34, 35. Page 

 35 is devoted to a drawing by MacGillivray giving — anterior view and somewhat 

 enlarged — the digestive tract of an adult male specimen (preserved in spirits) of 

 Ectopistes migratorius. 



3 Shufeldt, R. W. " Osteology of the Passenger Pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius). 

 The Auk, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July, 1914, pp. 358-362, Plate XXXIV. I have also 

 published other papers on the osteology of this bird in the Proc. Zool. Soc. of Lon- 

 don, Journal of Morphology, American Naturalist, etc.; these are duly cited in 

 ' The Auk ' article. 



