Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 July 1895 — Rare and Costly Eggs. [ARTICLE]

Rare and Costly Eggs.

An egg worth over SIOOO is something of a rarity, but there is one to be seen in the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. It is something smaller than an ordinary goose egg, and is of a dark olive green color, splotched and spotted with black and deep brown. It is an egg of the great auk, a bird that has not been seen alive for more than fifty years, and is supposed to be extinct. In the same case with the egg is a stuffed specimen of the bird. The bird and egg are valued at $3,000, but it is doubtful if the academy would part with the egg alone for the money. Some years ago one of these eggs was offered for sale in London and brought the enormous price of $1,500. The great auk has not been seen in its native haunts in Iceland since 1848, when the last specimen known to scientists was captured. There are only two of the eggs in this country, and less than a dozen in the world.