o 1597 wiederkommen
verzicht ... Durch Levinvm Hvlsivm. Editio Quinta.
Getruckt zu Franckfurt am Maeyn durch Hartmann
Palthenium in Verlegung der Hulfischen. Anno
M.DC.XXV., _From a copy of the book in the British
Museum. By permission of the Keeper of Printed
Books._ p. 22

III. THE MASKED OR BLUE-FACED GANNET (_Sula cyanops_,
_S. personata_). _From an example in the Royal
Scottish Museum. By permission of the Director._ p. 35

_In the Manuel d'Ornithologie (1828) Lesson
writes: 'Le Fou Manche de Velours, "manga de
velado" des navigateurs portugais, que l'on dit
etre le fou de Bassan, est de moitie plus petit.
Ce serait donc une race distincte.' tom. II. p.
375. And in the Traite d'Ornithologie the same
author amplifies thus what he has written: 'Fou
Manche de Velours; Sula dactylatra, Less. Zool.
de la Coq., Texte, part. 2, p. 494. Espece
confondue avec le fou de Bassan adulte; est le
manga de Velado des Portugais. Plumage blanc
pur; ailes et queue noires; bec corne; tarses
jaunes; la base du bec cerclee d'une peau nue,
qui s'etend sur la gorge en forme de
demi-cercle. Femelle: Grise. L'ile de
l'Ascension, les mers chaudes des Tropiques.'
Texte, p. 601._

THE RUKH OF MARCO POLO

Marco Polo, had he confined himself to a sober narration of his travels,
would have left to posterity a valuable record of the political
institutions and national customs of the peoples of his day in the Far
East. He was not satisfied with doing this, but added to his narrative a
number of _on-dit_ more or less marvellous in character, which he
collected from credulous or inventive persons with whom he came into
contact, principally from mariners and from other travellers.

Of these addenda to his story not one is more incredible than that of
the rukh, and yet that addendum may be regarded as indicating the
transition from the utterly incredible to the admixture of truth with
fiction in bird-lore. For, whilst the rukh possessed some
characteristics which are utterly fabulous, others are credible enough.
We are told, for example, that it resembled an eagle, that it was
carnivorous, that it possessed remarkable powers of flight, and that it
visited islands which lay to the south of Zanzibar, within the