102 BRITISH BIRDS. 



Mr. Yarrell, in his first edition, gives a quotation from Booth's ' Ana- 

 lytical Dictionary,' which states that Pigeons " have no gall-bladder ; and 

 therefore the secretions of the liver are, as it is supposed, never converted 

 into black bile, a fluid which has been in all ages associated with the irritable 

 passions of mankind." We know with what the Dove has been associated. 

 With reference to the gall-bladder, Mr. A. H. Garrod (P. Z. S. 1874, p. 249) 

 states that " Nitzsch mentions the want of cseca to the intestine and gall- 

 bladder in Goura. Hunter notes the same facts. Professor Owen ('Ana- 

 tomy of Vertebrates,' vol.ii. p. 177) says that the gall-bladder is constantly defi- 

 cient. This is so in most of the Columbss ; but, besides being developed in 

 the Pteroclidas, it is found in all the species of Ptilonopus, Lopholcemus, and 

 Carpophaga." 



Dr. Otto Finsch (P. Z. S. 1874, p. 94), " On a new Fruit-Pigeon, Ptilo- 

 nopus huttoni, from the Pacific Island of Rapa or Opara," among other things, 

 says : — " The geographical distribution of the Fruit-Pigeons in the numerous 

 islands of the Pacific is very interesting, and confirms the rule that insular 

 regions produce a great quantity of species, peculiar in many cases to very 

 small islands." He then gives numerous instances, and adds : — " In those 

 island groups where two species occur, these are totally different and 

 confined in their distribution to certain localities. ... So small an island as 

 Rapa produces one of the most remarkable of the group. We find it 

 extremely difficult to explain what has caused such extraordinary phenomena." 

 The article should be read in full. 



OTIS TARDA, Linn. 



(The Great Bustard.) 



The account of this bird, now unfortunately lost to England, has been so 

 well and exhaustively written by Mr. Henry Stevenson, in the ' Birds of 



