Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1898-07-13
THE GREAT AUX.
Bones OF a Fine Specimen Recently
Found In Ireland.

Bones OF a Fine Specimen Recently
Found In Ireland.
Slowly but surely a number OF crea'
lures are disappearing from the fauna
of the world, and the process has be-
come more rapid during the last hun
dred years Among these lost or mOri-
bund species is the great aux, which Is
now only known from specimens In
collections, or from the occasional dis
covery of its bones in circumstances
which in themselves often help to eX-
plain the cause Of Its disappearance.
1t has Just been announced that some
bones Of the great aux have been found
In kitchen hidden In the north OF Ire
land. The phrase is indirectly an epi-
taph: "Killed and eaten by man" was
the end Of this bird. A kitchen mid
den is nothing more nor less than a
pr!meval refuse-heap. The term Is the
translation of the Scandinavian name,
for, as 1t happens, these refuse-heaps
are particularly large and abundant on
some parts Of the Danish coast. Prac-
tically, they are shell-mOunds. Prime
val man, when he lived upon the sea
coast, made full use Of the food which
he found ready to hand. To be fish
erman requires some skill; but to gath.
er mussels from the rocks may be done
by the lowest savage. So 'the first
oyster" was an experiment Of such
remote antiquity that we know not by
what manner of men 1t was made. Per-
haps they had not even gotten so far as
to chip fiints into shape; at any rate,
In all probability their handicraft was
very primitive, their notions OF dress
rudimentary. In Denmark, on the
eastern coast, heaps Of shells, Of which
the contents have been eaten, are by
no means rare. Sir John Lubbock de
scribes, in his "Pre-historic Times,
one Of the largest, at Meilgard, In
northeast Jutland, as great fattish
mound, about ten feet thick in the mid
die, composed almost entirely Of shells
These usually belong to four specie:
the oyster, the cookie. the mussel and
the periwinkle, the first being the COM
lonest at that particular place. All, II
will be noticed, are still eaten, though
the oyster, from an ordinary article Of
food, has become a luxury. Besides
tDeSe, Us mig III De eApeStel III ieI uHc
heap which, no doubt, was formed
close to a settlement, other odds and
ends are found. though much more
rarely, such as bones of various beasts
and birds, Clipped hints or other stone
implements. and fragments of very
coarse pottery. These relies belong to
the Neolithic age-that Is, to time
when men were sufficiently advanced
to have acquired the art of making
weapons Of polished stone, though they
were ignorant of the use of metals.
Such refuse heaps are met with In 9th
er countries, more especially on the
coasts of Wales, Scotland and Ireland,
though they are usually smaller In size
than those OF Denmark. In them, more
than once, the bones of the great aux
have been found. Time has brought
about its revenges. In those days the
bird was, no doubt, valued, but sim
ply because 1t was good to eat, and
there was plenty of 1t. hundred
wears ago sailors took exactly the same
view as man in the Stone Age. Now
IL Is difficult to imagine what price 4
specimen In the flesh would commani:
for in April. 1895. a bid of $50 guineis
was refused for a skin. and ut the same
time an egg sold for IS" snireas