course, have its feathers so modified as to serve only as a clothing to the skin, and they
would no longer exhibit that peculiar compactness, and those beautiful mechanical arrangements
which are seen in the feathers of volatile birds.
If the Dodo, then, be neither a Penguin, an Auk, nor an Ostrich, it must evidently be
either an entirely unique and independent organization, representing in its own person a
whole order of birds, or (which is far more probable) it must be an exceptional form of some
other group, to which it stands in the same relation as the Ostriches to the Bustards, the
Penguins to the Divers, or the Alca impennis to the other genera of Alcidce.
We have seen that the Dodo can be referred neither to the Grallatorial nor Natatorial
orders. Its great bulk, and the vast strength and curvature of the beak, seem equally to
remove it from the Insessores, properly so called. There apparently remain, therefore, only
the Gallinaceous and Raptorial orders with which we can compare it.
Before stating my own views of this question, I will give a brief notice of the opinions
of some recent naturalists, whose criticisms are philosophical in spirit, if not correct in result.
The arrangements of earlier systematists may be omitted, as being too crude and vague to be
worth recording.
Mr. Vigors, in his elaborate paper on the “ Affinities of Birds,” in the Linnæan Transactions,
1 vol. xiv. p. 484, referred the Dodo to the Gallinaceous order, and considered it. to be
intermediate between the Struthionidoe and the genus Çraæ. His words are as follows :— ;
“ The bird in question, from every account which we have of its economy, and from the appearance
of its head and foot, is decidedly gallinaceous ; and from the insufficiency of its wings for the
purposes of flight, it may with equal certainty be pronounced to be of the Struthious structure, and
referable to the present family {Struthionidoe). But the foot has a strong hind toe, and, with the
exception of its being more robust,—in which character it still adheres to the Struthionidoe,—it corresponds
exactly with the foot of the Lmnæan genus Crax, that commences the succeeding family.
The bird thus becomes osculant, and forms a strong point of junction between these two conterminous
groups, which though evidently approaching each other in general points of-similitude, would not
exhibit that intimate bond of connection which we have seen to prevail almost uniformly throughout
the neighbouring subdivisions , of nature, were it not for the intervention of this important genus.” ,
M. De Blainville, in the Nouvelles Annales du Museum d ’Histoire Naturelle, vol. iv.
p. 24, objects to this arrangement on the following grounds : 1st, the form of the beak, in which
the strength, the terminal hook, the nudity of the base, the width of the gape, remind us. (as he
says) of a rapacious rather than of a granivorous bird ; 2ndly, the position of the nostrils, which
are not provided with an incumbent scale ; 3rdly, the strength and curvature of the claws ;
4thly, the strength and shortness of the legs ; 5thly, the squamous covering of the tarsi ; 6thly,
the short and woolly plumage of the head and neck ; 7thly, the alleged toughness and bad
taste of the flesh ; and 8thly, the absence of metatarsal spines. He consequently concludes
1 M. De Blainville, who seems to be acquainted with* this valuable paper by Mr. Vigors, only from a brief
notice of it in Mr. Duncan’s “ Memoir on the Dodo,” in the Zoological Journal, vol. iii. p. 558, tells us that it is
written by “ un auteur anonyme, mais que je crois être M. Macleay.”
that the Dodo is a Raptorial bird, allied to the Vultures, in proof of which he adduces:
1, the eyes placed in the smooth area of the beak, as in Cathartes; 2, the oval nostrils placed
very forward on the beak, and without incumbent scale; 3, the form, size, and colour of
the beak, resembling those of Sarcorhamphus; 4, the form of the cranium, its width between
the orbits, its flattening on the sinciput, as in the last-named Vulture; 5, the twp caruncular
folds at the base of the curved portion of the beak, somewhat as in Sarcorham/phus; 6, the
hood of skin like that of Cathartes; 7, the almost naked neck, of a greenish colour; 8, the
form, number, and arrangement of the toes, and the strength aqd curvature of the claws;
9, the squamose system of the tarsi and toes; 10, the crop at the base of the neck and
the muscular stomach, which are common, as he says, to the two orders; and 11, the absence
of the metatarsal spine.
Notwithstanding these apparent agreements with the Rapacious order, M. de Blainville
admits that the legs of the Dodo are much shorter and stronger than in any known Vulture;
that the toes are not connected, as in the Vultures, by a membrane ; and that the inability
to fly appears even a greater anomaly in a rapacious, than in a gallinaceous bird. These
difficulties, however, do not prevent him from giving his vote in favour of the Raptorial
affinities of the Dodo.
The Baron de la Fresnaye, in an outline of his classification of the Birds of Prey, adopts
M. de Blamville’s views, and makes the Didince the first, or lowest, sub-family of the
Vulturidce (Revue Zoologique, 1839, p. 193). In accordance with this idea, he conjectures
that the Dodo inhabited the sea-coasts, and fed upon the remains of Crustacea, Mollusca,
and other offal cast up by the waves.
Mr. Gould, from a consideration of the several characters above enumerated, and
especially the compression of the beak and nudity of the face, arrived at the same conclusion
as M. de Blainville (Nouv. Ann. Mus. Hist. Nat. vol. iv. p. 34).
Mr. J. E. Gray has expressed the opinion that the bird represented in the pictures of the
Dodo was made up artificially by joining the head of a bird of prey approaching the Vultures,
if not belonging to that family, to the legs of a Gallinaceous bird. But, as Mr. Broderip well
remarks, “ if this be granted, see what we have to deal with. We have then two species,
which are either extinct, or have escaped the researches of all zoologists, to account for; one,
a bird of prey, to judge from its bill, larger than the Condor; the other, a Gallinaceous bird,
whose pillar-like legs must have supported an enormous body.” Mr. Gray’s opinion is based
on the following grounds:—
“ 1. The base of the bill is enveloped in a cere, as may be seen in the cast, where the folds of the
cere are distinctly exhibited, especially over the back of the nostrils. The cere is only found in the
Raptorial birds.
“ 2. The nostrils are placed exactly in front of the cere, as they are in the other Raptores; they
are oval and nearly erect, as they are in the true Vultures, and in that genus alone, and not longitudinal
as they are in the Cathartes, all the Gallinaceous birds, Grallatores, and Natatores; and they are
naked, and covered with an arched scale, as is the case in all the Gallmacea.