Ferdinand von Mueller

1

Letter not found. For the text given here, see Herald (Melbourne), 17 December 1866, p. 4 (B66.12.05). M attached a cutting with this letter to his letter to R. Owen, 25 December 1866 (in this edition as 66-12-25c). For a fuller description see M to the Editor of the Australasian, 15 December 1867.

A New Cassowary From North Queensland.

To the Editor of the Herald

Sir, — A hasty glance on the notes and sketch received this day, and referring to a cassowary discovered by G. Randall Johnson, Esq., in North East Australia, left me at first under the impression that the Australian species did not differ specifically from the Casuarius Galeatus of Vieillot, which ranges so extensively over insular India.

2

i.e. the Indonesian archipelago.

On close comparison, however, the Australian casoar is found to differ from the original Indian species in the absence of the brown-violet oblique band across the neck; in the extension of the pure blue of the latter to beyond the cervical appendages near the sternum, the blue colour of the skin extending in a triangular form on both sides to the thorax. Moreover, the wings are provided with a sixth quill. Other marks of differences will, no doubt, become apparent whenever the only specimen hitherto obtained may arrive. In bringing this new and highly-conspicuous bird now under general notice, I deem it but right to attach to it for specific discrimination the name of the discoverer, and hence it received the appellation Casuarius Johnsonii; a similar tribute having been rendered to my friend, the accomplished zoologist and physician, Dr. George Bennett, of Sydney, when he made the second cassowary — the Mooruk of New Britain (Casuarius Bennettii, Gould) , a bird widely distinct from ours - accessible to science.

Melbourne Botanical Gardens,

15th December.