
THE DODO 
AND THE 
PRESUMED EXTINCT BIRDS OF MADAGASCAR AND 
THE MAURITIUS, &e. 

THE remains of the Dodo were long popularly known in Oxford 
and in the British Museum, and although generally talked of by 
‘the public, and latterly attempted to be ranged in most general 
systems of Ornithology, it was not until the model-monographic and 
historico-physical investigations of Mr, Strickland and Dr. Melville 
appeared, that the real interest in the subject arose. It was one of 
our main objects, these gentlemen write, to draw the attention of 
others to this subject: ‘Many a curious scrap of Dodo-knowledge 
is doubtless still buried in the holes and corners of libraries, mu- 
seums, and picture galleries, and many a precious bone-fragment 
still moulders in the caverns and alluvions of the Mascarene Islands.” 
The same yiews have induced us now to place together the informa- 
tion, that Mr, Strickland has collected since the publication of the 
“Dodo and its Kindred,” with any other that has occurred, in 
the hope that it might come before individuals placed in or near 
these islands, and be the means of attracting them to do what they 
can to clear up the true form and habits of those remarkable birds. 
Man, and the animals trained by him to the chase, have been the 
Means of extirpating or driving away to more retired haunts, those 
birds not provided with the powers of flying, and where the locality 
has been insular, this is more easily and rapidly accomplished. Such 
has been the ease with the gigantic birds of New Zealand, now 
dwindled down to a few rare specimens of the unobtrusive Apteryx. 
The Emu of Australia is flying before the settlers, and an Ostrich 
cannot now be seen within hundreds of miles of the Cape. At the 
same time, as our information of the interior of large islands 
has become more extended, there are apparent indications that 
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