lia, New Guinea and some of the neighboring- islands. The 

 mounds built by these birds are entirely composed of vegetable 

 matters collected industriously from the surface of the ground. 

 That of T. lathauri measures as much as six to seven feet in 

 height and twelve to fourteen in diameter, but this pile is not the 

 work of a single pair, and sometimes seems to contain the eggs 

 of two females in the same season. The heat in the central por- 

 tions of these mounds reaches 37° to 39 Centigrade. This Tale- 

 galla inhabits the whole of the eastern part of Australia, its eggs 

 are highly prized both by aborigines and colonists, and the bird 

 itself is easily tamed and of excellent flavor. 



The remaining species of the genus inhabit New Guinea and 

 the surrounding isles. 



The most widely spread and largest genus of the family is that 

 from which its name is derived. Nineteen species of Megapo- 

 dius, distributed over a large part of Oceanica and in some of the 

 Indian isles, are distinguished by our author. Most of these 

 have somber, uniform plumage, and all live in brush or forest, 

 generally near the sea, feed upon fruits, seeds, insects and worms, 

 deposit their eggs in mounds of sand, earth and vegetable matter, 

 and do not care for their young, which are robust and completely 

 feathered when hatched/ Alf run swiltlv, but fly heavily. M. 

 dilkvvni. inhabits the Philippine islands; jf. nicobmiensis, the 

 islands from which it is named (it is the Omaah, Meka and Dale 

 of the natives); M. la /nrons/i, the Marianne islands; M. sencx, 

 the Pelew islands; M. ,/.//;/, Xinafou or Good Hope island near 

 the Tonga archipelago ; and M. layardi, the New Hebrides. Thus 

 the geographical distribution of the group is much wider than has 

 been hitherto believed. 



The mounds of M. duperrevi, the best known species, a native 

 of New Guinea and Queensland, sometimes reach a height of 

 fourteen feet and a circumference of a hundred and forty feet, but 

 such mounds are the work of generations of birds, and are only 

 found in places where they have worked undisturbed bv egg- 

 hunting aborigines or colonists. A height of five or six feet is 

 usual. 



Donnelly's Atlantis. 1 — The author's purpose in preparing 

 this book, is to demonstrate some thirteen propositions, several 

 of which he claims to be novel ; and here we think the author is 

 correct. Some of them are as follows : 



1. That there once existed in the Atlantic ocean, opposite the 

 mouth of the Mediterranean sea, a large island, which was the 



as Atlantis. 



2. That the description of this island, given by Plato, is not, as 

 has been long supposed, fable, but veritable history. 



