Note 131 — ERRATA. (continued 7)

The following note I received from my friend, since the above was prepared for the press. “My male Booby died the other day. I found animalcules in the liver. Its anatomy exhibited, in a remarkably interesting manner, the fine adaptation for the purposes of buoyancy, detailed by Professor Owen in the dissection of the kindred Gannet. The muscles showed the air-vessels interspersed among them, in a manner altogether surprising. They had the appearance, as he expresses it, of being dissected. The bird, in the act of expiring, had almost entirely discharged the air from about the chest; but very considerable inflation still subsisted in the thighs. The large femoral muscle might be said to be almost entirely detached from the enveloping integument. The septa of the cells seemed alone to attach it to the adjacent flesh. There was no adhesion, but along one of its edges.” The cells were strongly united to the skin; and the roots of the feathers protruded into the internal cavities, as if they grew out of nothing. The cells must have performed their office with marvellous readiness, for the nerves were easily traceable among them. The air-vessels were like so many colourless bubbles.

“The bird had died during the night by the side of the coop on which they both usually roosted, but without attempting to perch. As I removed the dead bird before the other Booby had quitted its morning roost, it was interesting to see it, under a sense of loneliness, running its head into every opened door, to seek its lost companion.”