60 EVIDENCES OF BREVIPENNATE [Parr I. 
bat, denominated 7’ Oiseau bleu, which are skinned and eaten as a great delicacy.” This is 
evidently a blunder, as regards the “Oiseau bleu’’ being a éa¢, but it proves that some 
author besides the Sieur D. B. has noticed the Ozseaw bleu of Bourbon, though I have been 
unable to discover from what work this statement is copied. 
6. We have evidence that one, at least, of these apterous species of birds continued to 
inhabit Bourbon till nearly the middle of the last century. M. Billiard, who resided in 
that island between 1817 and 1820, and appears to have had access to some of the original 
archives of the island, tells us that at the time of its first colonization “the woods were filled 
with birds which were not alarmed at the approach of man. Among these was the Dodo or 
Solitaire, which was pursued on foot; they were still to be seen in the time of M. de la 
Bourdonnaye, who sent a specimen as a curiosity to one of the Directors of the Company.” 
Now M. de la Bourdonnaye was Governor of the Isles of France and Bourbon from 1735 to 
1746, so that these singular birds must have survived till the former, and may have continued 
till the latter date at least. 
7. In Grant’s Mauritius, p. 167, is an extract from “ Observations on the Isle of Bourbon 
in 1763, by an Officer of the British Navy,” which may possibly indicate that these singular 
birds survived in that island as recently as the above date :— 
“The plain des Caffres is formed by the summits of mountains at a very considerable elevation 
above the sea. ..... On this elevated plain there are small trees, with broom, furze, a kind of 
wild oat, and fern, which grows to the height of a shrub. There are also some curious birds which 
never descend to the sea-side, and who are so little accustomed to, or alarmed at, the sight of man, 
that they suffer themselves to be killed by the stroke of a walking-stick.” 
Whether the ‘curious birds”’ here alluded to, be referable to the brevipennate group or 
not, does not appear, but it seems certain that in 1801, when Bory St. Vincent made a 
careful scientific survey of the Island of Bourbon, no such birds were then in existence.’ 
Our evidence respecting the brevipennate birds of Bourbon is at present confined to 
Historical testimony. No delineations of these creatures appear to be now extant, and their 
osseous remains have never yet been sought for, and have consequently never yet been found. 
We cannot therefore at present decide whether these extinct birds were more allied to the 
Dodo of Mauritius, or to the Ostrich of Africa, though from the descriptions given, the former 
supposition is most probable. We naturally look to the little-known island of Madagascar 
as the region most likely to contain birds allied by affinity to those of Bourbon. No recent 
' The reader must beware of adducing an additional testimony from a passage which that careless compiler, 
Grant, in his chapter on Bourbon, professes to quote from Du Quesne :—‘ The Giant and the Dodo are large birds 
of an extraordinary height, which frequent the rivers and lakes, and whose flesh is like that of the Bittern.” 
(Hist. of Mauritius, p. 154.) In Du Quesne’s account of Bourbon (drawn up apparently as an emigrant-trap) as 
quoted by Leguat, p. 56 (for I have not been able to find the original), the words are “Les Géans sont de grands 
oiseaux montés sur des échasses,” &e. The words “and the Dodo” are therefore an interpolation of Grant’s, nor 
does the English translator of Leguat mend the matter (p. 41), by rendering Géans into Peacocks! The fact is, 
that these Géans are evidently (notwithstanding the Stork-like aspect of Leguat’s plate at p. 171) Flamingos. 
a 
