1 78 



KNOWLEDGE & SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[July, 1905. 



ever, not composed of dung;, but of a substance said lo 

 resemble vegetable resin, and believed to be composed 

 of a gastric — more probably salivarj- — secretion com- 

 bined with the woody fragments of fruit. During her 

 incarceration the female is fed by the male, who, for this 

 purpose, brings up the contents of his gizzard enclosed 

 within the inner lining of this organ. 



Parrots and Touracoes may be met with, and so also 

 may the curious Coly or Mouse-bird, and the celebrated 

 Honey-guide (Indicator), which, like many cuckoos, is 

 parasitic. 



A word as to Cape pigeons and penguins, which will 

 be the first of the many new birds which will greet the 

 eye of those who are making their maiden trip to South 

 Africa. The Cape pigeon is, though so-called, not a 

 pigeon but a petrel {Daption capcnsis). 



The penguin is the species known as the Black-footed 

 Penguin {Sphcniscus demcrsiis). These representatives of 

 a really remarkable group are still numerous, and after 

 the breeding season may be met with in huge flocks 

 some fifty miles from land. Layard, in his " Birds of 

 South Africa," describes these birds as having the 

 " feet placed so far back as to cause the bird to appear 

 alwavs falling backwards if it attempts to stand on 

 land." It is not easy to understand how such a state- 

 ment came to be made, for it is well known that 

 penguins of all species walk well, if not hurried. The 

 penguin is an expert diver, using its remarkably trans- 

 formed wings — which now resemble paddles super- 

 ficially, hardly distinguishable from the paddles of the 

 porpoises, for example — when under water, after the 

 fashion of birds that fly, the feet being held back- 

 wards as in a bird in flight. The prey is caught and 

 swallowed under water. Though it is not generally 

 known, the nostrils of these birds have become 

 obliterated, as in gannets and cormorants, so that 

 breathing is possible only through the mouth. 



The 



Extinct Reptile Favina 

 of Sovith Africa. 



The biological importance of the wonderful series 

 of remains of extinct South African reptiles which 

 has been gradually brought to light from the rocks of 

 the Karoo system of Cape Colony, Griqualand West, 

 and adjacent territories, hardly needs emphasis. Were 

 it not for the discovery of this reptilian fauna a gap 

 would have remained in that chain of animal evolution 

 which it has been found possible to construct during 

 the last few years. For, as a matter of fact, these 

 marvellous Karoo reptiles actually supply the connect- 

 ing link between the now widely sundered reptilian 

 and mammalian classes; and without the evidence they 

 afford it may be affirmed that not even the most in- 

 genious and far-seeing of evolutionists could ever have 

 realised how intimate and complete was the connection 

 between these two groups in past times. Needless to 

 say, the closeness of the relationship was by no means 

 fully appreciated at the first outset; and although at an 

 early stage of the investigation Professor Owen was 

 enabled to point to a number of very remarkable 

 mammalian resemblances, both in respect of their bones 



and their teeth, it was reserved for his successors to 

 fully demonstrate that in these strange African reptiles 

 of a bygone age we have the actual representatives of 

 the ancestral stock from which mammals originated. 

 Possibly even this does not fully emphasize the strength 

 of the case in regard to the interest and importance 

 attaching to these South African reptiles, for since they 

 have representatives in other parts of the world, it 

 might thereby be inferred that these non-African species 

 would have supplied all the inft)rmation that is really 

 essential in regard lo the kinship between mammals and 

 reptiles. As a matter of fact, this is not the case; and 

 there is a considerable probability that Africa, known 

 to have existed as a continental area for a prodigiously 

 long period of time, was really the nursery in which 

 the mammalian type was first evolved from its reptilian 

 ancestry, and that some of the African mammal-like 

 reptiles already known to us are not far removed from 

 being links between the two groups. 



Science is indebted for the first discovery of their 

 remains to the late Mr. A. G. Bain, an engineer who was 

 employed in the early part of last century in the con- 

 struction of military roads on the northern and eastern 

 frontiers of Cape Colony. The actual first discovery 

 appears to have been made by him in 1838, in a spot 

 situated somewhat to the north of Fort Beaufort, near 

 Mildenhalis. A letter from Mr. Bain, dated Fort 

 Beaufort, April 28, 1844, addressed to the Geological 

 Society, records the discovery. Accounts also appeared 

 from time to time in local journals at the Cape, in some 

 of which it is mentioned that Mr. Bain's attention was 

 first attracted by portions of bone projecting from the 

 rock. 



After being cleared from matrix, and thus made 

 available, the fossils were described by Professor Owen 

 as a kind of appendix to Mr. Bain's " letter." Mr. 

 Bain, in the latter, referred to the most remarkable of 

 his fossils under the name of " bidentals," in allusion 

 to the single pair of large tusk-like teeth with which 

 the upper jaw is armed, and it was to a skull of this 

 type that Professor Owen gave the name of Dicynodon. 



In 1S52 Mr. Bain sent another large consignment of 

 reptilian fossils to our Geological Society, which, on 

 the advice of the Professor, were subsequently trans- 

 ferred to the British Museum, together, apparently, 

 with the first collection. 



The interest aroused by Professor Owen's descrip- 

 tion of these remarkable reptiles, as well as by his refer- 

 ences to them in lectures delivered before the Royal 

 College of Surgeons, was very great. Among those 

 specially interested was the late Prince Consort, who 

 impressed upon his son, the late Prince Alfred (after- 

 wards Duke of I'idinburgh), then about to travel in 

 South Africa, the importance of endeavouring to obtain 

 additional specimens. This advice was not neglected, 

 and on his return from South Africa in i860. Prince 

 Alfred forwarded Professor Owen two skulls, which 

 were described by the latter in the " Philosophical 

 Transactions " of the Royal Society for 1862. One of 

 the skulls, which belonged to a genus nearly allied to 

 Dicynodon, indicated a new species, and was named 

 I'lyclwgnalhus alfredi, in honour of the royal collector. 



I^revious to this. Sir George Grey, then Governor of 

 Cape Colony, had also become interested in these dis- 

 co\eries; and it was lo him that Professor Owen was 

 indebted for the first example of a representative of 

 the carnivorous section of these reptiles. Mr. Thomas 

 Bain, son of and successor to the original collector, was 

 likewise an energetic worker, and as time went on im- 

 portant collections of these fossils were brought to- 



