Marvels of the Universe 



517 



Photo by'] [,s7r //. //. Johnston, a.CJf.G. 



THE LESSER SUPERB BIRD OF PARADISE. 



TKe male has a superb Rorget of emeralH-green sliot with 



turquoise-blue. From the sides of the necU grow out huge plumes 



of velvet-black tinged with purple and sepia-brown. The female is 



only brown and grey, without any plumes. 



credit the reiterated statements of the 

 Austrahan natives, that the female Platy- 

 pus lays eggs at the end of a long burrow 

 in the river's bank, from which the young 

 are eventually hatched. To bring aquatic 

 creatures of this kind ali\-e to Europe 

 would probably be very difficult ; and the 

 attempts hitherto made have all ended in 

 failure. 



One of the earliest naturalists to study 

 the natural history of the living Platypus 

 was Dr. George Bennett, who procured 

 from the natives specimens of the young 

 soon after they were hatched, but who 

 nevertheless refused to belie\'e the story of 

 their origin. Thus matters remained till 

 the 'eighties, when an English natiuralist 

 was despatched to .Vustraha to investigate 

 the whole question ; the result being to 

 confirm the native statements that the female lays a couple of soft-shelled eggs about as large as 

 those of a whi'-ethroat in a chamber at the end of her burrow. This important discovery was made 

 in 1884. It had been previously known that the skeleton of the Duck-bill presents several most 

 important resemblances to that of lizards ; and when it was subsequently ascertained, not only that 

 the young are hatched from eggs, but that the temperature of the blood of the adults is considerably 

 lower than that of ordinary mammals, it became a practical certainty that this strange Australian 

 creature was to a great extent a link between mammals and reptiles, although so much nearer 

 to the former than to the latter as to be included by naturalists in the mammalian class. 



Nor was this all, for some years after the settlement of the egg question it was found that, till 

 nearly full grown, the Platypus has two pairs of true teeth of a peculiar type in the upper jaw, and 

 three pairs in the low-er jaw ; and also that these teeth appear to have some resemblance to those 

 of certain extinct mammal-like reptiles. When the animal becomes full grown, these teeth fall 

 out, and are replaced by horny plates, 

 which were long supposed to be the only 

 tooth-like structures ever developed in the 

 Platypus. One other discovery showing the 

 low grade of the creature, is that the milk 

 of the female, instead of being supplied to 

 the young by means of a special nipple, 

 or teat, is merely discharged on to the 

 surface of the breast through a number of 

 minute pores, and is then lapped up by the 

 young. 



But even these did not exhaust the list 

 of errors and misunderstandings connected 

 with the Platypus, for there is another 

 which is perpetuated in every picture of the _ ., r... „ „ , i , ^. ^ „ ^ 



I c J sr pho(oby] - 'fir H. H. Johnslnn, O.C.Af.n. 



animal that has come under my notice. the standard-bearer bird of paradise. 



In all such illustrations it will be observed This remarkable form, discovered by Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace 



, in the island of Jilolo, has two of the wing feathers prolonged into 



that when the Duck-bill is on land whitish plumes which can be erected liUe pennants. 



