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Show 102 MR. A. H. GARROD ON CARPOPHAGA LATRANS. [Jan. 15, The large cartilaginous three-way piece, in which the trachea terminates inferiorly, is compound, being formed of several fixed rings. It is complete in front, being represented behind by a hooked process on either side, extending inwards towards the middle line, where the two nearly meet. The lateral muscles of the trachea extend down to the upper margin of this peculiar syrinx; and a few of their anterior fibres continue onwards to the surface of the cartilaginous box, where they terminate, sometimes higher and sometimes lower, but always before reaching its inferior margin. 8. Note on the Gizzard and other Organs of Carpophaga latrans. B y A. H . G A R R O D , M.A., F.R.S., Prosector to the Society. [Received December 3, 1877.] In the collection of birds preserved in spirit by H.M.S. • Challenger' is the body, after the skin had been removed, of a single specimen of Carpophaga latrans, together with the gizzard of a second individual of the same species, obtained at Kandavu, Fiji. These form the material for the present communication. In his note-book Mr. John Murrray makes the following remarks on the species1:-"Stomach contained the fruit of some tree unknown to me. The coat of the stomach had hard papilla-like ossifications of a circular form, two or three rows. . . . These indurations are composed of a horny substance"-from which it is seen that Mr. Murray was the first to recognize the existence of the strange arrangement to be here described. The thin-walled and capacious crop contained only one thing in its interior-a complete fruit, which has been identified for me by Mr. W . T. Thiselton Dyer, as that of Oncocarpus vitiensis. In the gizzard was also found a portion of a second example of the same fruit. Oncocarpus vitiensis is a tree belonging to the natural order Ana-cardiaceae, which, according to Dr. Seemann 2, is " about sixty feet high, bearing large oblong leaves and a very curious corky fruit, somewhat resembling the seed of a walnut." The tree is included among those which are poisonous by the Fijians ; and its sap produces an intense itching of the skin, when brought into contact with it, whence the native name Kau Karo or itch-wood. For the crushing of this very hard fruit a special anatomical modification of the gizzard-walls of this Fruit-pigeon is developed, which is peculiarly interesting and tends to prove the plasticity of organs when aberrant forces come into play. The gizzard is not developed to any thing like the extent that it is 1 Vide P. Z. S. 1877, p. 737. 2 Seeman's Mission to Viti, p. 334. |