64 



ELI!MBNTS OF OBNITHOLOGX. 



bulk. Yet a Bird of Prey (Harpagomis), as large as an Eagle, 

 and with enormous talons, existed there also, and is thought 

 to have been powerful enough to have made the smaller 

 Moas its prey. Three other noteworthy Birds which have 

 become extinct may here also be referred to. The first is the 

 Dodo (Bidus ineptus), which inhabited Mauritius and became 

 extinct by the end of the seventeenth century. The second 

 is the Solitaire {Pezophwps solitarius), which was larger than a 

 Turkey and lived to a somewhat later day than the Dodo, but 

 in the island of Eodriguez. The third extinct kind {Mpyornis 



Fig. 66. 



Mantell's Apteryx {Aptert/x mantelli). 



maximus) lived in Madagascar, and may have done so to within 

 the last two centuries. It was a huge creature, and laid so 

 enormous an egg that it may have given rise to the fable of the 

 Eoc's egg. Such is the case, because its egg may in early times 

 have been an article of commerce ; and the judgment that the 

 size of an egg is a sure index to the proportions of the parent 

 Bird is a very natural judgment, though an erroneous one. 



Other Birds, differing much more than these from all existing 

 Birds, became extinct in much more ancient times. Such were 

 the Hesperor'nis, the Ichfhyornis, and the Archoeopteryx, which 



