GUINEA FOWL, a well-known domestic gallinaceous bird, so called from the country whence in modern times it was brought to Europe, the _Meleagris_ and _Avis_ or _Gallina Numidica_ of ancient authors.[1] Little is positively known of the wild stock to which we owe our tame birds, nor can the period of its reintroduction (for there is apparently no evidence of its domestication being continuous from the time of the Romans) be assigned more than roughly to that of the African discoveries of the Portuguese. It does not seem to have been commonly known till the middle of the 16th century, when John Caius sent a description and figure, with the name _Gallus Mauritanus_, to Gesner, who published both in his _Paralipomena_ in 1555, and in the same year Belon also gave a notice and woodcut under the name of _Poulle de la Guinee_; but while the former authors properly referred their bird to the ancient _Meleagris_, the latter confounded the _Meleagris_ and the turkey. The ordinary guinea fowl of the poultry-yard (see also POULTRY AND POULTRY-FARMING) is the _Numida meleagris_ of ornithologists. The chief or only changes which domestication seems to have induced in its appearance are a tendency to albinism generally shown in the plumage of its lower parts, and frequently, though not always, the conversion of the colour of its legs and feet from dark greyish-brown to bright orange. That the home of this species is West Africa from the Gambia[2] to the Gaboon is certain, but its range in the interior is quite unknown. It appears to have been imported early into the Cape Verd Islands, where, as also in some of the Greater Antilles and in Ascension, it has run wild. Representing the species in South Africa we have the _N. coronata_, which is very numerous from the Cape Colony to Ovampoland, and the _N. cornuta_ of Drs Finsch and Hartlaub, which replaces it in the west as far as the Zambesi. Madagascar also has its peculiar species, distinguishable by its red crown, the _N. mitrata_ of Pallas, a name which has often been misapplied to the last. This bird has been introduced to Rodriguez, where it is now found wild. Abyssinia is inhabited by another species, the _N. ptilorhyncha_,[3] which differs from all the foregoing by the absence of any red colouring about the head. Very different from all of them, and the finest species known, is the _N. vulturina_ of Zanzibar, conspicuous by the bright blue in its plumage, the hackles that adorn the lower part of its neck, and its long tail. By some writers it is thought to form a separate genus, _Acryllium_. All these guinea fowls except the last are characterized by having the crown bare of feathers and elevated into a bony "helmet," but there is another group (to which the name _Guttera_ has been given) in which a thick tuft of feathers ornaments the top of the head. This contains four or five species, all inhabiting some part or other of Africa, the best known being the _N. cristata_ from Sierra Leone and