Cu. I.] OF THE DODO. 33 
very greatly increased by the careful dissection which Dr. Acland, the Lecturer in Anatomy, 
has made of one side of the cranium.!' By dividing the skin down the mesial line, and 
removing it from the left side, the entire osteological structure of this extraordinary skull is 
exposed to view, while on the other side of the head the external covering remains un- 
disturbed. See Plates VIII. and IX. 
The foot, which accompanies this interesting cranium, was formerly covered with decom- 
posed integuments, which presented few external characters. These have recently been 
removed by Dr. Kidd, the Professor of Medicine, who has made an interesting preparation of 
the osseous and tendinous structures, and exhibited some remarkable characters to which I 
shall presently advert. 
3. I have now to speak of the cranium, mentioned by Olearius as being, in 1666, in the 
Gottorf Museum at Copenhagen. ‘This specimen, after being forgotten for nearly two 
centuries, was very lately discovered by Professor C. Reinhardt (see Kréyer’s Tidskrift, vol. iv. 
p-71, and Lehmann in Nov. Act. Ac. Leop. Car. vol. xxi. p. 491), amongst a heap of venerable 
rubbish, and is now in the public museum at Copenhagen, where, two years ago, I had an 
opportunity of examining it. All the soft parts are removed, and it exhibits the same 
important osteological characters which have been recently brought to light in the Oxford 
head. It is, however, less perfect, the base of the occiput bemg removed. It is about half 
an inch shorter than the Ashmolean specimen, and proportionably smaller. 
These are the only known fragments which are ascertained to be genuine relics of the 
Dodo. Yet it cannot be doubted that if a judicious series of researches were made in the 
caves and superficial deposits of the island of Mauritius, many more osseous remains might be 
disinterred, and possibly the entire skeleton might be reconstructed. I rejoice to find, by a 
recent letter from G. C. Cuninghame, Esq. to Sir W. C. Trevelyan, that this problem has 
attracted the attention of the Natural History Society of Mauritius, who propose making 
excavations for this especial object. 
Let us now endeavour to combine into one view the results of the historical, pictorial, and 
anatomical data which we possess respecting the Dodo. We must figure it to ourselves as a 
massive clumsy bird, ungraceful in its form, and with a slow waddling motion. We cannot 
form a better idea of it than by imagining a young Duck or Gosling enlarged to the dimen- 
sions of a Swan. It affords one of those cases, of which we have many examples in Zoology, 
where a species, or a part of the organs in a species, remains permanently in an undeveloped 
or infantine state. Such a condition has reference to peculiarities in the mode of life of the 
animal, which render certain organs unnecessary, and they therefore are retained through life 
1 Zoologists are indebted to P. B. Duncan, Esq., Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, who liberally permitted 
this important dissection of a unique specimen to take place, and I have great pleasure also in recording that it 
was performed “ annuentibus Vice-cancellario aliisque Curatoribus,’ A.D. 1847. 
