Cu. 1.] OF THE DODO. 39 
food by preying upon the members of its own class; and if it did not exclusively subsist on dead and 
decaying organized matter, it most probably restricted its attacks to the class of Reptiles and to the 
littoral Fishes, Crustacea, &c., which its well-developed back-toe and claw would enable it to seize and 
hold with a firm gripe.” 
It is however evident from the many counter-arguments which both De Blainville and 
Owen have with great impartiality adduced, that their conclusions as to the Raptorial 
affinities of the Dodo are far from being absolutely demonstrated. If there are objections 
to the Galliaceous hypothesis, there are at least as many to the Raptorial one, and the 
systematic zoologist finds no more satisfaction in the one conclusion than in the other. If 
however we look a little further into the field of ornithic creation, we shall find a family of 
birds ready to claim relationship with this pedestrian outcast, and to admit him among their 
kindred. 
The various zoologists who have hitherto attempted the classification of the Dodo, appear 
to have been unconsciously influenced by its colossal stature, and they consequently compared 
it only with birds of large size, like the Ostrich, the Vulture, or the Albatross. But although 
each zoological group is characterized by certain limits of magnitude, yet the range between 
those limits is often very great, and where the characters of structure in two organisms essen- 
tially correspond, no amount of diversity in mere size ought to justify their separation. It 
is by overcoming this prejudice, as to the importance of size in classification, that the Menura, 
e.g., has been recently removed from the Rasores to its true place among the Jzsessores, and 
T must now call upon zoologists to make a similar concession in regard to the Dodo. 
The extensive group of Columbide, or Pigeons, is very isolated in character, and though 
probably intermediate between the Insessorial and Gallinaceous orders, can with difficulty 
be referred to either. In this group we find some genera that live wholly in trees, others 
which are entirely terrestrial, while the majority, of which the common Wood-Pigeon is an 
instance, combine both these modes of life. But the main characteristic of all is their diet, 
composed almost exclusively of the seeds of various plants and trees. We accordingly find 
much diversity in the forms of their beaks, according to the size and mechanical structure of 
the seeds on which each genus is destined to live. ‘Those which feed on cereal grains and 
the seeds of small grasses and other plants, like the Common Pigeon and Turtle-dove, have 
the beak considerably elongated, feeble, and slender. But in tropical countries there are 
several groups of Pigeons called Nutmeg-eaters and Trerons, which feed on the large fruits 
and berries of various kinds of palms, fig, nutmeg, and other trees. These birds, and 
especially those of the genus Zreron (Vinago of Cuvier), have the beak much stouter than 
other Pigeons, the corneous portion being strongly arched and compressed, so as greatly to 
resemble the structure of certam Rapacious birds, especially of the Vulturine family. 
This Raptorial form of beak is carried to the greatest extent in the genus Didunculus, a 
very singular bird of the Samoan Islands in the Pacific Ocean (see plate VII. f.1). Very 
little is yet known of its habits, but Mr. Stair, a missionary recently returned from 
M 
