Note 17 — Chapter IV · THE TURKEY HISTORIC
Reading edition
Pennant's article is illustrated by a folding plate giving the leg of a turkey bearing a supernumery toe situated in front of the tibiotarsus with the claw above. The note in reference to it is here reproduced in order to complete the article. Philos. Trans., Vol. LXXI, Ab. III, p. 80:
"To this account I beg leave to lay before you the very extraordinary appearance on the thigh of a turkey bred in my poultry yard, and which was killed a few years ago for the table. The servant in plucking it was very unexpectedly wounded in the hand. On examination the cause appeared so singular that the bird was brought to me. I discovered that from the thigh-bone issued a short upright process, and to that grew a large and strong toe, with a sharp and crooked claw, exactly resembling that of a rapacious bird."