200. Gigantic Bird.
M. Henderstrom has discovered in that part of the Russian dominions which he calls New Siberia, the claws of a bird, measuring each a yard in length, and the Yakuts assured him they had frequently in their hunting excursions met with skeletons, and even feathers of this bird, the quills of which were large enough to admit a man's fist. This is the strongest fact which has yet appeared in support of the almost universal tradition, that the earth was formerly inhabited by a race of giants. For though men not exceeding ourselves in stature might have defended themselves against the Megatherion, they would have been helpless against birds of prey of this magnitude.
There is a passage in the Viage de las Goletas Mexicana y Sutil, which gives some reason for supposing that this bird is not extinct. A chief at Nootka, where the image of a large bird seemed to be held in some degree of veneration, drew such a monster, with the additional monstrosity of two horns upon its head, carrying away a whale in its talons, and he affirmed that he had seen a bird of that kind pounce upon a whale and fly off with it. The Spaniards observed, he must have been dreaming, but he insisted upon the literal truth of what he had related. The original passage is as follows: Notamos que la Canoa tenia en la proa un gran aguilucho de talla, cuya figura hubiamos visto tambien en otras canoas de guerra. Estos Indios, parece, tienen cierta idea de temor o de veneracion a la efigie de esta ave, asi como los naturales de California la tienen particular gratitud, por haber sacado, dicen ellos, a un Indio de un pozo. Tetacus habiendo tomado lapiz que estaba sobre una mesa, entre otros dibuxos que hizo en un papel, nos figuro con esmero un aguila en accion de volar; tenia la cabeza muy grande, y dos cuernos en ella; la represento llevando asida en sus garras a una ballena y nos aseguro habia el visto descender rapidamente de las alturas al mar proximo a su habitacion un ave de aquella especie, agarrar a una ballena, y volverse a elevar. Le reproduxo Valdes que estaria durmiendo quando creyo ver cosa tan extrana; y el aseguro que estaba tan dispierto como quando lo contaba. Esto, a falta de los conocimientos de su religion que no fue posible adquirir, nos indica el mucho lugar que tienen en la creencia de estos pueblos las fabulas, siendo de presumir que entre ios paises pasara por mas ilustrada en aquella, el que tenga imaginacion mas viva.
Suayuk, it afterwards appears, is the name of this bird. In this incredulous age, I suppose, most persons will agree with the Spaniards in incredulity, and even the probability that Tetacus's whale may have been a porpoise, will not bring the story within the limits of their belief. But whether we have really found Henderstrom's bird at Nootka, or not, I think no person, after perusing the following extract from Cook's first voyage, will deny, or doubt, that we have found his nest in New Holland. "At two in the afternoon we set out from Lizard Island to return to the ship (then lying in Endeavour River), and in our way landed upon the low sandy island with trees upon it, which we had remarked in our going out. Upon this island we saw an incredible number of birds, chiefly sea fowl; we found also the nest of an eagle with young ones, which we killed: "and the nest of some other bird, we knew not what, of a most enormous size: it was built with sticks upon the ground, and was no less than six and twenty feet in circumference, and two feet eight inches high." Book 3, chap. 5.
This nest is well proportioned to the Siberian claw, and a bird of correpondent magnitude would be as able to carry off a porpoise as the common eagle is to fly away with a lamb. Endeavour River is unluckily too far from Botany Bay for a party to go there birds-nesting.