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Show 2 2 8 MR. J. T. CUNNINGHAM ON [Mar. 17, 13| feet and 17 feet respectively, and a feather has been actually sent to France which measures 2 metres 85 centims. in length (say 9| feet). In 1884 Mr. Gerald Waller, of Twywell, imported a pen of these birds ; and from his statements we gather that they are known in Japan as Shinowaratao, Shirifuzi, or Sakawatao fowls and various other names. He says the very long-tailed ones are kept in high, narrow cages, always sitting on a perch covered with straw-rope, with no room to turn or get down, but with a food- and water-tin at each end of the perch. Three times daily they are lifted down for a few minutes' exercise, their tails being carefully rolled up in paper cases to keep them from injury. The Japanese state that a tail has been measured 23 feet in length, and that the birds only moult the tail once in three years. This last statement is highly interesting. It is obvious that if a tail 23 feet long were grown in one year, it must be at the rate of nearly three-quarters of an inch per day; and though Madame Bodinus states that she could see the tails grow daily, it is difficult to realise this ; but experience will soon decide the point. The birds which have reached Europe have never yet exceeded 5 or 6 feet in length of feather, which is not beyond the possibility of a single season, though it appears of an enormous length. The saddle-hackles of Mr. Waller's birds are 16 inches in length; but it is manifest that such enormous feathers as reported from Japan could never be preserved under the ordinary conditions of an English poultry-yard. The feathers are not only long but extremely narrow and flexible, trailing low after the birds." Mr. Wright does not mention the comb, but the illustration which he gives represents the male bird with what is called a pea-comb of small size and with small wattles, whereas the specimens in the National Museum have single vertical serrated combs and large wattles. The pea-comb is a rounded mass, with small rounded tubercles projecting from it. Mr. Frank Bice, of Acton, Suffolk, who breeds Yokohamas, gives in his circular the same illustration which appears in Mr. Wright's book, and which therefore is certainly not a new figure from a living specimen. But in his description he states that the head should be neat and small, with evenly-set pea-comb. It would thus appear that the long-tailed fowls comprise varieties which differ in comb as well as in colour, though they seem to be all similar in the excessive growth of the tail, and probably are all grown in Japan under the same artificial treatment. The principal purpose of this paper is to discuss the causes by which the elongation or excessive growth of the tail has been produced. About two years ago, Prof. Lankester, in a letter to ‘ Nature,' referred to the specimens in the Museum of which he is Director as " a magnificent sport," comparing their exceptional character to what is called genius in human beings. On the other hand, in the ‘ Dictionary of Birds ' by Newton and Gadow, article " Feather," the length of the tail-feathers is attributed to |
