Fig. 48. The Great Auk (Plautits impennis**). 



* In The Century Magazine for January, 1886 (pp. 352-365), I published an article entitled 

 " Feathered Forms of Other Days," illustrated by a number of figures, and among them one of the 

 Great Auk, it being a copyrighted copy of my original painting of that famous bird. Century Company 

 having declined to loan me an electro for the figure published by them, I was compelled to make a 

 photograph of my original, and figure 48 (above) is the half-tone reproduction of that photograph. 



The Century figure appeared reduced under the word Alea in The Century Dictionary, where it 

 is stated that I copied my Figure from Audubon. Such, however, was by no means the case, and who- 

 ever it was that compiled the ornithological articles of that great work, either was not familiar with 

 Audubon's figure of the bird, or else no artist— or both. In making this drawing 1 used the mounted 

 specimen of the Great Auk in the Smithsonian Institution chiefly as my guide and model, and made 

 use of the Audubon plate only in part. 



Fig. 48 then is a fac-simile of my original, and appears now for the first time. R. W. S. 



