m DODO. 



oar guids killed maw turkeys, and two pole-cats, which he art, 

 esteeming them before f.t turkey*." 



With regard to the form of the bill, we mutt be careful how we lay 

 too much aliis* on that. Who would have expected to find a bill 

 " long, slender, mouth, and polished, in form resembling Uiat of an 

 IbaCbut rather more straight and Jsprsssaj at the bane," on an Emeu 

 like body with nworiol legs and feet f Yet luoh is the form of Aptcryt. 

 As to the argument aricing from UM abeeoee of the spur, it U worth 

 but little at bee* ; and it ma; be eaid in favour of those who would 

 pkee the Dodo between UM Struthious and Oallinaoioui Birds, that 

 tta absence in soch an oseulant bird would be expected. 



U the picture in the British Museum and the cut in Bontius be 

 faithful representation* of a creature then living, to make such a bird 

 a bird of prey* Vulture, in the ordinary acceptation of the term 

 would be to set all the usual laws of adaptation at defiance. A Vul- 

 ture without wimp 1 How was it to be fed f And not only without 

 wings, but necessarily slow and heavy in progression on ita clumsy 

 feet. The t*nJ<wuf<r are, as we know, among the most active agent* 

 for removing the rapidly decomposing animal remains in tropical and 

 utertropicaT climates, and they are provided with a prodigal develop- 

 ment of wing to waft them speedily to the spot tainted by the corrupt 

 inoumbranc*. But no such powers of wing would be required by a 

 bird appointed to clear away the decaying and decomposing mime* 

 of a luxuriant tropical vegetation a kind of Vulture for vegetable 

 impurities, so to speak and such an office would not be by any means 

 inconsistent with comparative slowness of pedestrian motion. 



Nevertheless we have the following expression of opinion from 

 Professor Owen, who in 1845 published a paper on the subject of the 

 Dodo in the ' Transaction* of the Zoological Society.' He concludes 

 his paper thus : " I'pon the whole then the Raptorial character pre- 

 vails most in the structure of the foot as in the general form of the 

 beak of the Dodo, and the present limited amount of our anatomical 

 knowlege of the extinct terrestrial bird of the Mauritius aupporU the 

 conclusion that it is an extremely modified form of the Raptorial 

 order. Devoid of the power of flight, it could have had small chance 

 of obtaining food by preying upon the members of its own class ; and 

 if it did not exclusively subsist on dead and decaying organised 

 matter, it most probably restricted its attacks to the class of reptiles 

 and to the littoral fishes, Crmtatta, Ac., which its well developed 

 back toe and claw would enable it to seize and hold with a firm gripe." 



Mr. Strickland, who is the last writer upon the affinities of the 

 Dodo, and has produced a work quite exhaustive of the subject, refers 

 the Dodo to the Col*mbid<r. 



" The extensive group of Columbida;, or Pigeons," says Mr. Strick 

 land, " is very isolated in character, and though probably intermediate 

 bet wean UM Inimsnriil and Oallinaoeous orders, can with difficulty 

 be referred-to either. In this group we find some genera that live 

 wholly in trees, others which are entirely terrestrial, while the 

 majority, of which the common Wood-Pigeon is an instance, combine 

 both these modes of life. But the main characteristic of all is theii 

 diet, couponed almost exclusively of the seeds of various plant* and 

 . We accordingly find much diversity in the forms of their 



liseks, according to the size and mechanical structure of the seeds on 

 which each genus is destined to live. Those which feed on cereal 

 grains and the issds of small grsssns and other plant*, like the 

 Common Pigeon and Turtle-Dove, have the beak considerably elon 

 gated, feeble, and slender. But in tropical countries there are 

 several groups of Pigeons called Nutmeg-Eaters and Trerons, whirl 

 feed on the Urge fruit* and berries of various kinds of palms, fig 

 nutmeg, and other tree*. These birds, and especially those of tin 

 genus Trtnm (Fieaye of Cuvier) have the beak much stouter than 

 other pigeon*, the corneous portion being strongly arched and com 

 prsessd, so as greatly to resemble the structure of certain Rapacious 

 Birds, especially of th* Vulturine family. This Raptorial form o 

 beak i* carried to the yesiest extent in the genus />i</mi.-Wm, a very 

 tegular bird of UM Bemoan Island* in the Pacific Ocean. Very littl 

 is yet known of H* habit*, but Mr. Stair, a missionary recently 

 ' m those islands, ha. reported that the bird feed* on 

 a. Its first discoverer, Mr. Titian P**le, an American 

 l (who** account i* I believe still unpublished) saw some 

 thing in its form or habit* that reminded him of the Dodo, and hence 

 to generic name. Mir W. Jardine, who first described the bird, under 

 the name of 0~/W, Urigimtri, in the Annals of Natural History 

 TO|. xvi p. 176, referred it oonjcturaUy to the JftpaMdirf*. thong 

 he noognicad in it several dove-lilt* characters. And Mr. Oould, wh 

 ha* given two figures of it in hi* 'Birds of Australia,' part 22, pro- 

 liouneesUMttlMbiHappraeiiMneaivt to the Pigeons. Weshallsoon 

 *e* the* UM Didine and Columbine hypotheses, though apparent! 

 ineungruou*. resolve themselves (as often happens) into one truth. 

 " Although osrUfai gsaara of OotmmUJa are thus seentoaasun 

 form of beak ranmtillH * * * toftorm, yet no two group* i 

 the same claes am he more opposed hi White and afflniUm than the 

 feroc*. Aquils.' and 'imbed** Columbe).' It i* interesting however 



Urity of structure. 



"If now we regaid the Dodo as an 

 TuKurea, but oftae** vulture-like 



i, not of th 

 we shall, 



DODO, 

 link, class it in a group whose characters are far more consistent with 



hat we know of it* structure and habit*. There is no a priori reason 



by a pigeon should not be so modified in conformity with external 



ircurnstanaes as to be incapable of flight, just as we Me a Qrallatorial 



ird modified into an Ostrich, and a Diver into a Penguin. Now, we 



are told that Mauritius, an island forty milee in length and about one 



mndred miles from the nearest land, was when discovered clothed 



with dense forests of palms and various other trees. A bird adapted 



to feed on the fruit* produced by these forests would in that equable 



limate have no occasion to migrate to distant lauds ; it would revel 



n the perpetual luxuriance of tropical vegetation, and would have 



ut little need of locomotion. Why then should it have the means of 



ying ' Such a bird inigLt wander from tree to tree, tearing with it* 



powerful beak the fruit* which strewed the ground, and digesting 



iieir strong kernels with its powerful gizzard, enjoying tranquillity 



and abundance, until the arrival of man destroyed the balance of 



animal life, and put a term to its existence. Such in my opinion was 



lie Dodo, a colossal brevipeniiato frugivorous pigeon." 



The first idea of referring the Dodo to the Pigeons seems to have 



jccurred to Professor Reinhardt of Copenhagen. To Mr. Strickland 



lowever must be given the credit of laboriously working out this 



des. We can here only refer to his volume, 'The Dodo and its 



Cindred,' for further information. In working out the anatomical 



letails he was assisted by Dr. Melville, now Professor of Natural 



listory, Queen's College, Galway, Ireland. This part of the work is 



remarkable for the detailed manner in which the subject is gone into, 



and the beautiful illustrations which accompany the text. 



We have now to draw attention to another part of this subject. In 

 peaking of the Dodo several references have been made to a bird 

 lled the Solitaire, and many of the writers quoted have confounded 

 t with the Dodo, or made it a second species. This bird was first 

 described by Leguat, who was for many years the commander of a 

 mrty of French Protestant refugees who settled upon the island of 

 .lodriguex in the year 1691. In his description* of the iale, which is 

 called either Diego-Kodrigo, or Diego-Ruys, or Rodrigo, he gives the 

 'allowing account : " We had also another creek on the other side of 

 our cabins, and full of oysters sticking to the rock. We went often 

 a breakfast there, and brought some home, with which we made an 

 excellent ragout with palm-tree cabbages and turtle's fat. Of nil tin- 

 birds in the island the most remarkable is that which goes by the 

 name of the Solitary (le Solitaire), because it is very seldom M.H-II in 

 company, though there are abundance of them. The feathers of thu 

 males are of a brown-gray colour ; the feet and beak are like a turkey' , 

 but a little more crooked. They have scarce any tail, but their hind 



C covered with feathers, is roundish like the crupper of a horse. 

 j are taller than turkeys. Their neck is straight, and a little; 

 longer in proportion than a turkey's, when it lifts up its head. Ita 

 eye is black and lively, and its head without comb or cop. They 

 never fly ; their wings are too little to support the weight of their 

 bodies ; they serve only to beat themselves and Slitter when they r.-ill 

 one another. They will whirl about for twenty or thirty times to- 

 gether on the same side during the space of four or five minutes ; the 

 motion of their wings makes then a noise very like that of rattle, 

 and one may hear it two hundred paces off. The bone of their wing 

 grows greater towards the extremity, and forms a little round mass 

 under the feathers as big as a musket-ball : that and its beak are the 

 chief defence of this bird. Tin very hard to catch it in the woods, 

 but easy in open places, because we run faster than they, and some- 

 time* we approach them without much trouble. From March to 

 September they are extremely fat, and taste admirably well, especially 

 while they are young. Some of the males weigh forty-five pound. 



" Th* female* are wonderfully beautiful, some fair, some brown : I 

 call them fair because they are of the colour of fair hair. They have 

 a sort of peak, like a widow's, upon their breast*, which is of a dun 

 colour. No one feather 1s straggling from the other all over th. i, 

 bodies, being very careful to adjust themselves and make them nil 

 even with their beaks. The feathers on their thighs are round like 

 shells at the end, and being there very thick, have an agreeable effect ; 

 they have two risings on their craws, and the feathers are whiter there 

 than the rent, which livelily represent the fine neck of a beautiful 

 woman. They walk with so much stateliness and good grace, that 

 on* cannot help admiring them and loving them, by which means 

 their fine mien often saves their live*. 



" Though these birds will sometimes very familiarly come up near 

 enough to one when we do not run after them, yet they will never 

 grow tame ; a* soon as they are caught they shed tears without crying, 

 and refuse all manner of sustenance till they die. We find in the 

 gizzards of both male and female a brown stone, of the bigness of a 

 hcii' egg ; it is somewhat rough, flat on one side, and round on the 

 other, heavy and hard. We believe this stone was there when they 

 were hatched, for let them be never so young you meet with it always. 

 Th-y have never but one "f them ; and besides, the passage from the 

 craw to the gizzard is so narrow that a like mass of half the bigness 

 could not peas. It served to whet our knives better than any other 

 stone whatsoever. When these birds build their nests they choose a 

 clean place, gather together some palm-leaves for that purpose, and 



* ' A new Vojrift to the but Indies by FruicU Ix-guat and his Companion*, 

 containing their Adrtnturn la two Desert Islands,' *c., BTO., London, 1708. 



