EXTINCT SPECIES. 151 



pondered too deeply. Therein lies the germ of some great 

 mystery. 



Keverting to bird-giants, past and present, it is assuredly 

 incorrect to assume as certain naturalists have assumed 

 that flying would have been incompatible with their bulk. 

 There exist birds of prey, of whose bodies the specific gravity 

 does not differ much from that of the ostrich, and are power- 

 ful in flight nevertheless. 



Another class of facts rises up in opposition to the hypo- 

 thesis, that mere grandeur of dimensions is the limit to winged 

 flying. The apterix and the manchot do not fly any more 

 than the ostrich. Neither of these is a large bird, nor, rela- 

 tively to size, a heavy bird. As regards the epiornis, the fact 

 is not universally accepted by naturalists that the creature 

 was like the ostrich, the apterix, and cassowary a mere 

 walking bird. An Italian naturalist, Signor Bianconi, has 

 noted a certain peculiarity in the metatarsal bones of the 

 creature, which induces him to refer it to the category of 

 winged birds of prey. If this hypothesis be tenable, then a 

 sort of giant vulture the epiornis would have been one in 

 whose imposing presence the condor of the Andes would have 

 dwindled to the dimensions of a buzzard. Further, if Signor 

 Bianconi's assumption hold good, then may we not have done 

 amiss in banishing the ' roc' to the realms of fiction 1 Old 

 Marco Polo, writing in the thirteenth century, described the 

 roc circumstantially; and his account has been long con- 

 sidered as either a fiction or a mistake. Signor Bianconi, 

 coming to the rescue of his fellow-countryman, thinks that 

 the Italian traveller may have actually described a giant bird 

 of prey extant at the time when he wrote, but which has now 

 become extinct. 



A notice of extinct birds would be incomplete without 

 reference to the dodo, the very existence of which had been 

 lately questioned ; so completely has it fleeted away from the 

 earth. Messrs. Broderip, Strickland, and Melville, however, 



