RAILS. 129 



dromus is one of the nearest allies of the Apteryx. This similarity may be the simple 

 result of similar influences acting on different natures, the diminished necessity for 

 the use of the anterior limbs allowing them to dwindle in both. But, with the facts 

 of geographical distribution to back it, the opinion may be fairly maintained that 

 Apteryx and Ocydromus had the same ancestor not far back in time. It may be aid 

 that the pelvis is very different ; but the same remark partly applies to Tfruzmuc, an 

 undoubted ally, and a bird also most probably of the same stock, though residing so 

 far off." With regard to the geographical distribution, we once more refer to our 

 remark under Itostratula (p. 110), with the addition that Ocydromine birds can also 

 be traced to the islands of the Mascarene fauna. When the earliest explorers came 

 to these islands, they found the dodo and other large and strange birds which were 

 deprived of the power of flight. These helpless creatures very soon became extinct, 

 by the direct action of man or by the mammals which the first navigators turned 

 loose, or the first settlers brought with them. Only some old pictures, scanty descrip- 

 tions, and a heap of bones collected by Prof. Xewton, are the remains from which we 

 have to construct our knowledge of these remarkable forms. A few of them were 

 brought alive to Europe, where they were figured. Among these are some paintings 

 on vellum of a curious-looking bird, with a long, snipe-like beak and no wings, 

 altogether very much like a kiwi. It is evidently the u ponle rouge an bee de Became, 7 * 

 from Mauritius, which is said by a Dutch preacher, J. C. Hoffmann, who lived there 

 in 1673-1675, to have been caught in the following manner: 



.V rod is taken in the right hand, and the left is wrapped in a piece of red stuff, 

 which is thus shown to the birds, commonly assembled in numerous flocks. Whether 

 the red color terrifies these stupid birds, or whether it attracts them, thev approach 

 the fowler almost without fear ; and he, when they are at a convenient distance, 

 strikes and seizes one. The cries which the captive utters attract its companions, 

 who seek to deliver it, and thus all become the prey of the fowler.** With this 

 * poule rouge,' Alphonse Milne-Edwards has identified a number of bones collected 

 in Mauritius by Edward Xewton, the examination of which resulted in the following 

 conclusion concerning the affinities of Aphanaptfryx broedrii^ as this bird has been 

 styled : " It evidently was one of the family Rallida?, and there is much less differ- 

 ence between it and Ocydromus than between this last and the [true] rails. 7 * 

 Another bird of the same family is the white *geant,' figured and described by 

 the French colonist, Leguat, who lived on Rodriguez during the last decade of 

 the seventeenth century. Lttfuatia gigantea, which measured six feet in height, 

 with a body as large as a goose, may possibly be a water-hen or gaUinule, with frontal 

 shield. 



The common wood-hen (O. at/fra/t*), or the weka, as it is called by the Maoris, is 

 .re one day to become extinct as was Leguat's *geant- ? We read in Buller's 

 History of the Birds of Xe\v Zealand that "the weka is too often killed only for mere 

 wantonness, or the pleasure of taking life. The Maoris of Arowhenua make expedi- 

 tions in the winter for obtaining a supply of these birds, which they preserve in their 

 own fat. On one run, near Burke's Pass, 1 have been told that over two thousand 

 wekas were secured by a party of natives at one of these hunts. Numbers are also 

 killed by the settlors for their oil, which is much esteemed for dressing saddle-straps 

 and for a variety of purposes.** 



Of an allied species, O. syleestris, which inhabits Lord Howe's Island, between 

 Zealand and Australia, we have the following account by Mr. R. D. Fitigerald: 



VOL. IV. 9 



