THE AVIAN SYRINX 
immature, and by a striped back in the very young, 
bird. The gaudy colours of the neck are sometimes con- 
tinued into one median and one or two laterally placed 
wattles, which are shaped like the bands of a “ clerk,” 
and the presence of which have given rise to two specific 
names of cassowaries ; these are distinguished, accord- 
ing to the presence of one or two of these wattles, as 
C. un-appendiculatus and C. bt-carunculatus. It is 
easy enough to say that the brilliant hues of the naked 
skinned throat are due to sexual selection ; but there 
is no doubt that they now occur in both sexes, and so 
they have been at any rate transferred from one sex 
to the other, and can no longer be reckoned as sex 
attractions. Cassowaries are quite diurnal birds and 
sleep peacefully during the night. Their voice has been 
described as “a curious sort of snorting, grunting and 
bellowing.” They have no proper voice organ com- 
parable to the syrinx of other birds. In disposition 
the cassowary has the reputation of being “sullen 
and treacherous,’’ and there is no doubt that it had 
better be approached at the Zoo with due circumspec- 
tion. For the bill is strong and so are the toes. Its 
food is mostly vegetable, though insects are apparently 
not scorned. It is a good swimmer, which may account 
for its occurrence on widely separated islands. The 
large dark green eggs are known to everybody; but 
everybody may not be aware that they are excellent 
eating. The bird itself is not altogether despicable 
from the gastronomic point of view. There is one 
story related of the cassowary which may be true, but 
does not bear the generally recognized hall mark of 
truth, repetition. A traveller in Australia observed 
one of these birds to enter the water and to squat down 
for a few moments. It then deliberately waded to the 
bank and shook from out its wings a multitude of small 
fishes, which it proceeded to devour. The suggestion 
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