\.yS Ttie Descent of Man. Taut II. 



»ble to disoovGr whether with these species the young resemble 

 the adult males more closely than the adult females ; for the 

 comparison is somewhat difficult to make on account of the double 

 moult. 



Turning now to the Ostrich order : the male of the commoB 

 cassowary (Casuarius ffaleatus) would be thought by any one 

 to bo the female, from his smaller size and from the appendage? 

 ai :d naked skin about his head being much less brightly coloured ; 

 ind I am informed by Mr. Bartlett that in the Zoological 

 Gardens^ it is certainly the male alone who sits on the eggs and 

 takes care of the young.^' The female is said by Mr. T. W. 

 Woiid '" to exhibit during the breeding season a most pugnacious 

 disposition; and her wattles then become enlarged and more 

 brilliantly coloured. So again the female of one of the emus 

 (^Dromceus irrorntvs) is considerably larger than the male, and 

 she possesses a slight top-knot, but is otherwise indistinguishable 

 in plumage. She appears, however, " to have greater power, 

 " when angry or otherwise e.xcited, of erecting, like a turkey- 

 " cock, the feathers of her neck and breast. She is usually the 

 " more courageous atid pugilistic. She makes a deep hollow 

 •' guttural boom especially at night, sounding like a small gong. 

 " The male has a slenderer frame and is more docile, with no 

 " voice beyond a suppressed hiss when angry, or a croak." He 

 not only performs the whole duty of incubation, but has to 

 defend the young from their mother ; " for as soon as she 

 '•■ catches sight of her progeny she becomes violently agitated, 

 " and notwithstanding the resistance of the father appears to 

 " use her utmost endeavours to destroy them. For months 

 " afterwards it is unsafe to put the parents together, violent 

 " quarrels being the inevitable result, in which the female gene- 

 " rally comes off conqueror." ^^ So that with this emu we have 

 ft complete reversal not only of the parental and incubating 

 instincts, but of the usual moral qualities of the two sexes; tlte 

 females being savage, quarrelsome, and noisy, the males gentle 

 and good. The case is very different with the African ostrich, 

 for the male is somewhat larger than the female and has finer 



It IS, as he informs me, with Limosa assertion, as Mr. Bartlett thinits, 



lapponica and some few other may be accounted for by the female 



Waders, in which the females are visiting the nest to lay her eggs. 



liiVLier and have more strongly con- ^^ ' The Student,' April, 1870, p. 



tr3st'?d colours than the males. 124. 



2' The natives of Ceram (Wallace, ^* See the excellent account of 



Malay Archipelago,* vol. ii. p. 150) tlie habits of this bird under coufine- 



3SS3rt that the male and female sit meut, by Mr, A. W. Bennett, in ' Land 



.Itf rnately on the eggs : but this and R'ater,' May, 18G8, p. 233. 



