1137 



GYNANDRIA. 



GYPOGERANUS. 



" We form this genus in eonfonnity with the opinion (d'aprcs 1'avis 

 of M. Desmarest, in order to place in it an animal closely approxi 

 mating to the Civets, and perhaps approximating still nearer to th 

 Paradoxuri, which are plantigrade. We place it provisionally among 

 the digitigrades. It has a pointed muzzle, a soft tongue, roundec 

 ears, erect and naked, compressed claws, curved and sharp, a nakec 

 tail, and the following dental formula : 



" Incisives, _ 



canines, 



11, 

 1 l' 



moRu-s, ?H^ = 40. 

 66 



" In the upper jaw the two middle incisives are the largest, am 

 separated (c'carte'es) one from the other ; the two lateral ones are ver 

 small ; the canines are moderate. The first molar has two points, the 

 second one only ; the fourth and fifth have four tubercles, the sixth 

 has only three. 



" In the lower jaw the canines are long. 



"Species, Gymnura Rafflesii, Vivcn-a Gymnura, Raffles. Thi 

 species, from the East Indies, has the muzzle, which exceeds the 

 lower jaw by an inch, pointed ; the eyes are small, the moustaches 

 long; the tail, which is naked, like that of a rat, is only 10 inches 

 long, and the head and body measure 1 foot. The fur consists of two 

 sorts of hair, a short under fur (bourre) very thick and soft, and a 

 long harsh hair ; the body, legs, and first half of the tail are black ; 

 the bead, the neck, and the shoulders are white ; a black band passes 

 over the eyes. Habits unknown." 



Gymnura Itiiffletii. Horsficld and Vigors. 



M. Lesson does not state from what specimen he has taken his 

 descriptions, which vary from those of Dr. Hdrsfield and Mr. Vigors, 

 in some instances essentially ; but the latter state the ample materials 

 from which they defined their characters. 



Cuvier says, " The genus (fymnura of Messrs. Vigors and Horsfield 

 ' Zool. Journal,' iii. pi. 8) appears to approach Cladobates in its teeth, 

 and the shrews (musaraigues) in its pointed muzzle and scaly tail. It 

 has five unguiculated toes on all its feet, and rather stiff bristles 

 (soies assez rudes) projecting forth from the woolly hair. It cannot 

 be well classed till its anatomy is known." 



The term Gymnura has been applied to designate a genus of Sea- 

 Ducks [DUCKS] ; and Spix uses the word Gymnuri as the name of a 

 family of South American Monkeys. 



GYNA'NDRIA, one of the classes in the artificial system of botany 

 invented by Linnaeus, the character of which is to have the stamens 

 and pistil consolidated into a single body. The principal part of 

 the class consists of Orchidaceous Plants, forming in it the order 

 ifonandria. 



GYNOCARDIA. [FLACOUKTIACE^.] 



GYPAfiTOS, Starr's generic name for the Liimmergeyer, or 

 Bearded Griffin (Gypaetos barbaius), a bird of prey which may be 

 considered as intermediate between the Eagles and the Vultures. 



[VULTURID.K.] 



GYPOGE'RANUS (Illiger), a genus of Birds embracing the well- 

 known Secretary Bird. Mr. Bennett, in the 'Tower Menagerie,' 

 remarks that the singular conformation of this bird, so different in 

 many respects from that of the order to which both in its leading 

 characters and in its habits it obviously belongs, rendered it for a 

 long time the torment of ornithologists, who puzzled themselves in' 

 vain to assign it a definite place in the system, and could not agree 

 even with regard to the grand division of the class to which it ought 

 to be referred. " Thus " continues the author, " M. Temminck was at 

 one time inclined toTefer it to the Gallinaceous order; and M. Vieillot, 

 after repeatedly changing his mind upon the subject, at last arranged 

 it among the Waders, with which it has absolutely nothing in com- 

 mon except the length of its legs. It appears however to be now 

 almost universally admitted that its closest affinity is with the 

 Vultures, with which it agrees in the most essential particulars of its 

 organisation, and from which it differs chiefiy in certain external 

 characters alone, which unquestionably give to it an aspect exceed- 

 ingly distinct, but are not of themselves of sufficient importance to 

 authorise its removal to a distant part of the classification. It con- 

 stitutes in fact one of those mixed and aberrant forms by means of 

 which the arbitrary divisions of natural -objects established by man are 



HAT. HIST. mv. vor,. n. 



so frequently assimilated to each other in the most beautiful, and 

 occasionally in the most unexpected manner." Mr. Swaiuson, in the 

 first volume of his 'Classification of Birds,' places the "Secretary 

 Vulture of Africa" among the Vultwidie; but in the second volume 

 of the same work (1837), he makes it a genus of the Aquilincc, & sub- 

 family of the Falconidce. 



Dr. Sparrman first saw this bird (a drawing of which, given by 

 M. Vosmaer under the denomination of Sagiltariu*, he alludes to) in 

 the neighbourhood of the warm baths of Hottentot Holland. " It is 

 not," he says, " a very shy bird, but when scared begins at first to 

 endeavour to save itself by alternately hopping and scudding along 

 very swiftly, and afterwards does it more effectually by flight. In 

 external appearance, in some respects it resembles the eagle, and in 

 others the crane, two birds certainly very unlike each other ; though 

 iu my opinion it ought to be referred to neither of these genera. The 

 Hottentots give it a name most suitable to its nature, namely, as 

 translated into Dutch, Slaugen-Vreeter (or Serpent-Eater); and in 

 fact it is for the purpose of confining within due bounds the race of 

 serpents, which in Africa is very extensive, that nature has principally 

 destined this bird. It is larger than our crane, with legs 2,^ feet long, 

 and the body in proportion less than the crane's. Its beak, claws, 

 stout thighs covered with feathers, and short neck, are like those of 

 the eagle and hawk kind." Then follows a particular description of 

 the bird, after which the Doctor continues thus : " This bird has a 

 peculiar method of seizing upon serpents. When it approaches them 

 it always^akes care to hold the point of one of its wings before it, in 



rendered it almost senseless, it then kills it and swallows it without 

 danger. _ Though I have very frequently seen the Secretary Bird, 

 both in its wild and tame state, yet I have never had an opportunity 

 of seeing this method it has of catching serpents ; however I cau by 

 no means harbour any doubt concerning it, after having had it con-' 

 Brmed to me by so many Hottentots as well as Christians ; and since 

 this bird has been observed at the menagerie at the Hague to amuse 

 and exercise itself in the same manner with a straw. If, finally, this 

 serpent-eater is to be referred to the Accipitres, or the Ha'vvk kind, 

 the name of Falco Serpentarius appears to be the most proper to 

 distinguish it by in the 'Systema Naturso.' It has even baen remarked 

 that these birds, when tame, will not disdain now and then to put up 

 with a nice chicken." 



Sparrman, it is true, did not himself see the scene which he 

 describes ; but that his account is correct in the main will not be 

 doubted when we present the reader with a translation of the testi- 

 mony of an eye-witness of one at whose relations the devoted 

 admirers of Buffoii were too apt to smile increduously, but whose 

 accuracy is now generally allowed to be unimpeachable. We give it 

 entire, because even in those parts which are not directly illustrative 

 of the habits of the bird, the difference between the actual observer, 

 .he field zoologist, who had studied nature in her own wilderness, and 

 ,he cabinet theorist, who had only viewed her through the false 

 medium of his own brilliant but delusive imagination, is strikingly 

 lisplayed. Le Vaillant, in one of his journeys iu the Namaqua 

 country, arrived at a spring at the very moment when a Secretary 

 was drinking there : he killed it at the first shot, and gave to the well 

 ,he name of the Secretary's Fountain. His narrative then proceeds as 

 'ollows : 



" The Dutch have named this bird the Secretary on account of the 

 uft of plumes which it carries at the back of the head ; for, in 

 lolland, clerks (gens de cabinet), when they are interrupted in their 

 writing, stick the pen among their hair behind the right ear> so as to 

 mitate in some degree its crest. Buffou, speaking of it, says that it 

 .as only been known at the Cape recently ; and the proof which he 

 idduces is, tha.t Kolbe and other succeeding writers say nothing of 

 t. This is advancing a groundless assertion (uu fait faux), and 

 indeavouring to prove it by another as true as the first. The 

 Secretary is known in the colonies both under the name of Secretaris 

 and that of Slang- Vreeter. It is under this last denomination that 

 Colbe speaks of it; and he certainly knew it, at least from the 

 elation of others, because he exactly enumerates all the kinds of 

 ood which it habitually takes. It is true that, in his description, he 

 rauslates the Dutch word Slang- Vreeter by the French word Pelican, 

 nd that consequently he makes a single species out of two very 

 ifferent ones. But Kolbe was no naturalist, and his work contains so 

 nany other errors that it would be astonishing not to find this. I have 

 '>eeii more surprised, I confess, to see that our modern naturalists, 

 ven those' who have spoken of the Secretary in the greatest detail, 

 uake no mention of three bony and blunt protuberances which it 

 las at the bend and last joint of the wings, but infinitely less appa- 

 ent than iu the Jacaua or iu the Kamicki. This omission has 

 ppeared strange to me, in Buffon particularly, who has not described 

 t from the relation of others, but from an individual which he had 

 efore his eyes, and which I believe was iu the cabinet of Mauduit. 

 t is nevertheless an essential omission, because it deprives the 

 ccretary of one of its principal distiuctive characters, and because 

 he protuberances of which I speak form one of the arms of the bird, 



4 D 



