Last Chance to See

by Douglas Adams

The most famous of all the animals on Mauritius is a large, gentle dove. A remarkably large dove, in fact: its weight is closest to that of a well-fed turkey. Its wings long ago gave up the idea of lifting such a plumpy off the ground and withered away into decorative little stumps. Once it gave up flying, it could adapt itself very well to the Mauritian seasonal cycle, and stuff itself silly in the late summer and autumn, when fruit is lying rich on the ground, and then live on its fat reserves, gradually losing weight, during the leaner, dry months. It didn’t need to fly anyway, since there were no predators that wished it any harm and it, in turn, is harmless itself. In fact, the whole idea of harm is something it has never learned to understand, so if you were to see one on the beach, it would be quite likely to walk right up to you and take a look, provided it could find a path through the armies of giant tortoises parading around the beach. There’s never even been any reason for humans to kill it because its meat is tough and bitter. It has a large, wide, downturned bill of yellow and green, which gives it a slightly glum and melancholic look, small, round eyes like diamonds, and three ridiculously little plumes sticking out of its tail. One of the first Englishmen to see this large dove said that “for shape and rareness, it might antagonise the Phoenix of Arabia.” None of us will ever see this bird though, because, sadly, the last one was clubbed to death by Dutch c...