Supplementary note on the great auk or garefowl (Alca impennis Linn) / by Symington Grieve.

  • Grieve, Symington.
Date:
[between 1890 and 1899?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Supplementary note on the great auk or garefowl (Alca impennis Linn) / by Symington Grieve. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    31/72 page 261
    1896-97-] paper in the 'Ibis,’ July 1894, p. 243, says: “This egg measures 4^jX2-|-£ inches, has a very rough texture, the markings being chiefly shell-spots. It was purchased by Mr Henry Munt for 175 guineas.” London.—Three eggs, collection of Mr T. G. Middlebrook, “Edinburgh Castle,” 57 Mornington Eoad, N.W. Ho. 1.—This egg was bought from Perrot, a dealer in Paris, on 23rd November 1847, for 200 francs (about £8, 3s. 4d.), by the late Sir William Milner, Bart, of Nunappleton, Yorkshire (‘Great Auk or Garefowl,’ p. 104). It was sold for his successor, Sir F. Milner, Bart., M.P., at the auction rooms of Mr J. C. Stevens, 38 King Street, Covent Garden, London, W.C., on 23rd April 1895, lot 261, for 180 guineas, at which price it was bought by Mr T. G. Middlebrook. Ho. 2.—The egg that was in the collection of the late Mr T. H. Potts, who died very suddenly in 1888, was seen by me at the house of his widow at Christchurch, New Zealand, who told me she was anxious to dispose of it. It was some years afterwards, about the beginning of 1891, purchased by Mr Henry 0. Forbes, then curator of the Canterbury Museum, Christchurch, H.Z., it was said for a friend in England.1 This is perhaps the only egg of Alca wipennis that has ever been in the Southern Hemisphere, and it has now found its way back to England. It was in the collection of Mr Leopold Field, 25 Brodrick Boad, London, S.W. He sold it to Mr Bowland Ward, F.Z.S., 166 Piccadilly, London, W. (see litt., 4th January 1897). I was shown this egg by Mrs Potts on 13th March 1889, and I find the following note in my diary: “ It is covered with small blotches, and finely marked with thick pencillings at the large end. It has a large amount of white on the body and a very little dark shading. Several of the marks are almost lost in the shell, as if they had been absorbed by the calcareous matter before the egg. was laid, but they show quite clearly. It is an average-sized egg, in a very good state of preservation, and has been end-blown. The holes at each end 1 ‘New Zealand Herald,’ monthly summary, 24th April 1891; also p. 89, and App., p. 31, Ihe Great Auk or Garefowl: its History, Archieology, and Remains.’
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