SHORT-WINGED CURSORIAL BIRDS. 30/ 



THE AUSTRALIAN CASSOWARY. 



The Australian Cassowary {Casuarius Australis). This bird stands about five feet high; 

 the head is without feathers, but covered with a blue skin. Like the Emu, it is almost wingless, its 

 wings being mere rudiments. The body is thickly enveloped in dark brown wiry feathers ; on the 

 head is a large prominence, or helmet, of bright red colour, and to the neck are attached, like so 

 many bells, six or eight round fleshy balls, of bright blue and scarlet, which give the bird a very 

 beautiful appearance. 



This Cassowary has never been brought to Europe, only one specimen having been until 

 recendy obtained, which unluckily was lost shortly after its capture. A communication from 

 P. A. Eagle, Esq., with which we have been kindly favoured, will best explain the importance 

 attached by scientific men to the discovery of this Australian species. 



" Compared with Asia," says Mr. Eagle, " Australia presents the greatest contrast in its natural 

 productions to be found between any two zoological regions of the earth ; and yet the line which 

 separates these two great provinces actually passes between t\vo of the islands forming part of the 

 great volcanic chain running from Sumatra to Timor, namely, the island of Bali on the west, and 

 Lombock on the east, separated from each other by no more than fifteen miles ; so that within a two 

 hours' sail, without losing sight of land, you pass from Bali, full of Fruit Thrushes, ^^'oodpeckers, and 

 the general ornithology of Asia, to Lombock, where the Cockatoos, Honey-eaters, Brush Turkeys, and 

 other members of the Australian fauna, appear suddenly in full force. The forests of Australia are 

 destroyed by myriads of timber-boring larvje of various insects ; but on the whole area there is not to 

 be found a single Woodpecker, or any bird to do its office ; yet, in the same latitudes, in any other 

 part of the world. Woodpeckers occur in special kinds for each great district in abundance, wherever 

 forest trees grow, their function being to pick out those timber-eating larvse from the wood. The 

 entire absence of the whole family of True Pheasants and Vultures, found in numbers in any other 

 great region of the earth, is also a striking negative character of the ornithology of Australia ; whilst 

 its innumerable Honey-eaters, Cockatoos, and Brush-tongued Lories, found in no other region, give 

 to it an equally marked positive character. 



" The very deep sea surrounding Ceram, and other islands which constitute the appendages, as 

 it were, of Asia on one side and Australia on the other, suggests a curious problem to the naturalist as 

 to how they got their inhabitants. Great interest, therefore, attaches to the recent discovery of a 

 Cassowary in Australia, as yet only imperfectly known, and so nearly related to tlie Cassowar}' of 

 Ceram that doubts have been expressed as to their distinctness. They are both incapable of flight, 

 the wings being represented by five or six bare, cylindrical, pointed quills, like those of a porcupine, 

 and, consequently, the bird could not fly nor pass from one island to another. The Casiiarms 

 Australis was first indicated by Mr. Wall, the naturalist to Kennedy's expedition, who shot a 

 specimen in a gully at Cape York, and a notice of it appeared in 1854 in a S3'dney paper ; but, as the 

 specimen was lost, much doubt existed as to the species. A bunch of feathers taken from a native 

 hut on the Upper Burdekin, and sent to Dr. Sclater in 1866, again drew attention to the probability 

 of a species of Cassowary inhabiting Australia, but still there was no evidence of the species. In 

 June, 1868, a specimen reached the Zoological Society of London ; and Dr. Sclater states that 

 although he had not compared it with the Cassowary of Ceram. it seemed to differ — first, in the 

 form of the crest ; secondly, in having thicker tarsi, and the long straight claw of the inner toe more 

 developed ; thirdly, by the cobalt-blue colour of the naked skin of the neck and throat. Yen,' recently, 

 however, a young specimen, about two feet long, has been presented to the National Museum of 

 Melbourne, which establishes the fact that it is truly distinct as a species from the so-called Indian 



