i6 
they live almost entirely among the trees and are strictly 
nocturnal, being found in the day time with heads bent down 
and noses stowed away between their forefeet. 
The Cassowary is also kept in this building during the 
winter, in summer finding quarters in a cage on the walk 
toward the Monkey House. There are some half dozen 
species of the genus Casuarius, mainly differing in the shape 
of the helmet on the head and the number and arrangement 
of the wattles hanging from the neck; all are natives of the 
islands of the Malayan Archipelago. They belong to the 
order of struthious birds, with the ostrich, rhea, emu, and 
apteryx, all of which are characterized by great development 
of the lower limbs at the expense of their powers of flight. 
The Common Cassowary {Casuarius galeatus) is from the 
island of Ceram, in the Indian Ocean. The feathers of this 
bird are of a peculiarly filamentous or hair-like character, en¬ 
tirely wanting in the webs which spring from the sides of the 
shaft in ordinary feathers. It is a bird of great power and 
endurance, rivaling even the ostrich in those qualities as well 
as in the famous powers of digestion which are so notorious 
in the latter bird. 
Other members of the same family are the Rhea {Rhea 
americana) from the plains of tropical America, and the 
Emu {Dromaus novce-hollandice) of Australia, the latter bird 
reaching nearly the proportions of the ostrich. 
No. 2.— THE MONKEY HOUSE. 
The present house for monkeys has been found too small 
and badly ventilated for the proper accommodation of the 
animals, and the Society has in contemplation the erection of 
a new and suitable building when circumstances will warrant 
its completion. 
The monkeys of the Old World, or of Africa, Asia, and the 
Malayan Islands, have been arranged by naturalists in one 
great group called Catarrhini , while those of the New World 
constitute another group known as Plaiyrrhini . They are 
very well marked in zoological characters, the most constant 
of which is that from which they derive their name. In the 
Catarrhini the septum, or cartilage dividing the nose, is nar- 
