Elephant bird determined that "Vorombe titan" reached weights of and stood tall, making it the world's largest bird, slightly larger than the much older "Dromornis stirtoni". Elephant birds have been extinct since at least the 17th century. Étienne de Flacourt, a French governor of Madagascar in the 1640s and 1650s, mentions an ostrich-like bird said to inhabit unpopulated regions, though it is unclear whether he was repeating folk tales passed on from generations earlier. In 1659, Flacourt wrote of the "vouropatra – a large bird which haunts the Ampatres and lays eggs like the ostriches; so that the people of these places
François Lays years of hardship, during which his need to provide a dowry for his eldest daughter Marie-Cécile forced him further into debt. Quéruel relates that Lays was finally reinstated only on 9 January 1821, but this assertion cannot be accurate because the singer's name often appeared on the theatre bills in the mean time, for example the whole period between July 1819 and June 1820. Whatever the case, in response to his renewed demands for economic support, the administration granted him further leave to perform privately outside Paris. Lays went on a tour of the Low Countries and also put on