THE AUSTRALIAN NATURALIST. 51 
Tench’s work is dated from Sydney Cove, “July 10th, 1788,” and 
unless official or other influence was intentionally exercised to 
delay its publication, it might have been the first in the field. 
‘ Phillip’s Voyage” was a compilation for which Stockdale, 
the Government Printer, was mainly responsible: This must 
have appeared very late in the year, as the plates are dated, 
and some of them were published as late as 20th October, 1789 
(ineluding the plate of the New Holland Cassowary). 
Tench’s'*‘ Narrative’ is of special interest, because the MS: 
had finally passed out of the author’s hands before British or 
foreign naturalists had had any opportunity of expressing their 
views upon the drawings or specimens of Australian animals, 
which were sent home as opportunity offered; and, therefore, 
theopinions about Australian animals expressed by Captain 
Tench were arrived at without his being influenced in any way 
by the determinations of experts in Europe. His account of - 
the emu is given in the following extract :— 
“To the naturalist this country holds out many invitations. | 
Birds, though not remarkably numerous, are in great variety, 
and of the most exquisite beauty of plumage, among which are 
the cockatoo, lowry, and parroquet: but the bird which 
principally claims attention is a species of ostrich, approaching 
nearer to the emu of South America than any other we know 
of. One of them was shot, at a considerable distance, with a 
single ball, by a convict employed’ for that purpose by’ the 
Governor ; its weight, when complete, was seventy pounds, and 
its length from the end of the toe to the tip of the beak, seven 
feet two inches, though there was reason to believe it had not 
attained its full growth. On dissection many anatomical 
singularities were observed: the gall-bladder was remarkably 
large; the liver not’ bigger than that of a barn-door fowl, and 
after the strictest search no gizzard could be found ; the legs, 
which were ofa vast length, were covered with thick, strong’ 
scales; plainly: indicating the animal to be formed’ for living 
amidst desarts; and the foot differed froman ostrich’s by forming 
a triangle, instead of being cloven. Goldsmith, whose account of 
the emu isthe only one I-can refer to, says‘that it is covered from’ 
the:back and rump with’ long feathers, which fall backward 
and cover the anus; these feathers’ are grey on the back and 
white on the belly.’ The wings are so small as hardly to 
deserve the name, and are’unfurnished with those beautiful 
ornaments which adorn the wings of the ostrich: all the’ 
feathers are extremly coarse, but the construction of them 
deserves notice—they grow in pairs from a single shaft, a 
singularity which the author Ihave quoted has omitted to re- - 
mark, It may be presumed that these birds are not very scarce, 
as several have been seen, some of them immensely large, but 
they are so wild as to make shooting them a matter of great 
difficulty. Though incapable of flying, they run with such — 
