Miscellaneous. 73 



there any Mammalia, with the exception of some large bats ; none 

 of those remarkable Lemuridse peculiar to the fauna of Madagascar 

 existed in the Mascarene Islands, The study of fossil birds leads to 

 the same result ; and the three species of ^pyornis which M. A. 

 Grandidier and I have been able to recognize among the fossils col- 

 lected in the swamps of the south-west coast have enabled us to 

 establish the relationship which connects these birds with the Dl- 

 nornis, the PaJapteryx, and Aptornis of New Zealand. All these 

 species belong to the same zoological type, and make us feel that at 

 a more or less remote epoch there may have existed some communi- 

 cation between these lands so far away from one another ; perhaps 

 groups of islands, now submerged, formed intermediate stations, of 

 which unfortunately we have now no trace. 



In France, from the earliest age of man, we remark sometimes 

 in superficial deposits, sometimes in caverns, fragments of birds which 

 furnish us with valuable indications of the climatal conditions of 

 that epoch. Some of these species have now entirely disappeared ; 

 others, in considerable numbers, have by degrees retired towards the 

 north — for instance, the grouse and the great hawk owl, which 

 then were extremely common in these countries. Their presence is 

 most significant ; for even supposing, according to some naturalists, 

 the reindeer is only found fossil in France because it had been in- 

 troduced by the Finnish population, we cannot invoke the same ex- 

 planation for birds which have never been domesticated. Lastly. 

 we also find in our caves a great number of species identical with 

 those which now inhabit temperate Europe — among others, the 

 cock, which was supposed to be a native of India, but which, on 

 the contrary, must have been a contemporary of the first ages of man. 

 It is especially the Middle Tertiary deposits which have furnished 

 me with a rich harvest. Thus in the Department of the Allier I have 

 recognized the presence of about 70 species belonging to very various 

 groups, some of which no longer belong to our fauna. Parrots and 

 Trogons inhabited the woods ; swallows built in the fissures of the 

 rocks nests in all probability like those now found in certain parts of 

 Asia and the Indian archipelago. A secretary bird nearly allied 

 to that of the Cape of Good Hope sought in the plains the ser- 

 pents and reptiles which at that time, as now, must have furnished 

 its nourishment. Large adjutants, cranes, flamingoes, the PaJte- 

 lodi (birds of curious forms, partaking at once of the characters of 

 the flamingoes and ordinary Grallae), and ibises frequented the 

 banks of the watercourses where the larvae of insects and mollusks 

 abounded ; pelicans floated in the midst of the lakes ; and, lastly, 

 sand-grouse and numerous gallinaceous birds assisted in giving to 

 this ornithological population a physiognomy with which it is im- 

 possible not to be struck, and which recalls to one's mind the de- 

 scriptions which Livingstone has given us of certain lakes of southern 

 Africa. 



The list I have given of the birds whose existence I have ascer- 

 tained in the part of the Miocene lakes the alluvium of which has 

 formed the deposits of St. Geraud le Puy, of Vaumas, &c., indicates 



Ann.& Mag. Nat. Hist. Ser. 4. VoLtl. 6 



