ADDRESS. lxxxiii 
phical range of its European representative, the strong-winged Lammer- 
geyer, is similarly restricted. ‘The Asiatic Phasianide and Pavonide are 
represented by Turkeys (Meleagris) in America ; by the Guinea-fowl (Nu- 
mida, Agelastus, Phasidus) in Africa; and by the Megapodide, or Mound- 
birds, in Australia. Several genera of Finches are peculiar to the Galapagos 
Islands ; the richly and fantastically ornate Birds of Paradise are restricted 
to New Guinea and some neighbouring isles. Mr. Sclater, who has contri- 
buted the latest summary of facts on the distribution of Birds, reckons 17 
families as peculiar to America, and 16 families as peculiar to Europe, Asia, 
and Africa. Some species have a singularly restricted locality, as, the Red- 
grouse (Tetrao scoticus) to the British Isles ; the Owl-parrot (Nestor pro- 
ductus) to Philip Island, a small spot near New Zealand. 
When birds have wings too short for flight, we marvel less at their re- 
stricted range; and particular genera of brevipennate birds have their pecu- 
liar continents or islands. The long- and strong-limbed Ostrich courses over 
the whole continent of Africa and conterminous Arabia. The genus of 
three-toed Ostriches (Rhea) is similarly restricted to South America. The 
Emeu (Dromaius) has Australia assigned to it. The continent of the Casso- 
wary (Casuarius) has been broken up into islands including and extending 
from the south-eastern peninsula of Asia to New Guinea and New Britain. 
The singular nocturnal wingless Kivi (Apéeryz) is peculiar to the islands of 
New Zealand. 
Other species and genera, which seem to be, like the Apterya, as it were 
mocked with feathers and rudiments of wings, have wholly ceased to exist 
within the memory of man in the islands to which they also were respectively 
restricted. The-Dodo (Didus ineptus) of the Mauritius, and the Solitaire 
(Pezophaps solitaria) are instances. 
In New Zealand also there existed, within the memory of the Maori ances- 
try, huge birds having their nearest affinities to the still existing Apteryx of 
that island, but generically distinct from that and all other known birds. I 
have proposed the name of Dinornis for this now extinct genus, of which 
more than a dozen well-defined species have come to my knowledge, all pecu- 
liar to New Zealand and the last-discovered the strangest, by reason of the 
elephantine proportions of its feet. 
A tridactyle wingless bird of another genus, 4pyornis, second only to the 
gigantic Dinornis in size, appears to have also recently become extinct—if 
it be extinct—in the Island of Madagascar. The egg of this bird, which 
may have suggested to the Arabian voyagers attaining Madagasear from the 
‘Red Sea the idea of the Roc of their romances, would hold the contents of 
6 eggs of the Ostrich, 16 eggs of the Cassowary, and 148 eggs of the common 
Fowl. 
The laws of geographical distribution, as affecting mammalian life, have 
been reduced to great exactness by observations continued since the time of 
Buffon, who first began to generalize, just a century ago, in that way, noting the 
2 f2 
