34-2 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



oue third. The extraordinary proportions of the metatarsus of this wingless 

 bird will be perhaps still better understood by comparison with the same bone 

 in the ostrich, in which the metatarsus is nineteen inches in length, the 

 breadth of its lower end being only two inches and a half. Professor Owen 

 contemplates the probability of reconstructing, from the materials accumulated 

 by Mr. Mantell, the entire skeleton of the elephant-footed Dinornis, which 

 would be a worthy companion of the Megatherium and Mastodon. The Dinor- 

 nis depliantopus appears to have been restricted to the Middle Island of New 

 Zealand. No bone or fragment of bone indicative of this species had ever 

 reached the author from any part of the North Island of New Zealand. The 

 specimens described, together with many other bones of the Dinornis elephan- 

 topiis, were discovered by Mr. ~\V. Mantell at Euamoa, three miles south of 

 the point called the First Rocky Head in the Admiralty charts of the island. 



THE GEEAT GLACIER OF GREENLAND. 



It was in full sight the mighty crystal bridge which connects the two 

 continents of America and Greenland. I say continents for Greenland, 

 however insulated it may ultimately prove to be, is in mass strictly conti- 

 nental. Its least possible axis, measured from Cape Farewell to the line of 

 this glacier, in the neighborhood of the 80th parallel, gives a length of more 

 than twelve hundred miles, not materially less than that of Australia from its 

 northern to its southern cape. Imagine, now, the centre of such a continent, 

 occupied through nearly its whole extent by a deep unbroken sea of ice that 

 gathers perennial increase from the water-shed of vast snow-covered moun- 

 tains and all the precipitations of the atmosphere upon its surface. Imagine 

 this moving onwards like a great glacial river seeking outlets at every ford 

 and valley, rolling its icy cataracts into the Atlantic and Greenland seas, and 

 having at last reached the northern limit of the land that has borne it up, 

 pouring out a mighty frozen torrent into unknown Arctic space. Dr. Kane's 

 Second Expedition. 



CEDAR SWAMPS OF NEW JERSEY. 



From the recent report on the geological survey of New Jersey, by Prof. 

 Kitchell, we derive the following description of the cedar swamps which con- 

 stitute so remarkable a feature in the forests of the southern part of this 

 State. 



These swamps are common to all the counties south of Monmouth, but 

 probably the most extensive are in Cape May, and the adjoining parts of 

 Cumberland and Atlantic counties. The Cedar Swamp creek which runs into 

 Tuckahoe river, and Dennis Creek, which runs into Delaware Bay, head in 

 the same swamp, and the whole length of the two streams, a distance of 

 seventeen miles, is one continuous cedar swamp. The wood is the white 

 cedar, the Cupressus thyoides of the botanist. The original growth of trees 

 which covered these swamps at the first settlement, has been all cut off; 

 scarcely any are to be found more than one hundred years old, and it is usual 

 to cut them at fifty or sixty years. Formerly they attained a great age, from 

 seven hundred to one thousand rings of annual growth having been counted 



