234 Zoological Societij. 



state as a pet animal. It was described as about two feet in length, 

 with coarse grisly hair ; and must have more nearly resembled the 

 Otter or Badger than the Beaver or the Ornithorhynchus, which the 

 first accounts seemed to suggest as the probable type. The offer of 

 a liberal reward induced some of the Maoris to start for the interior 

 of the country where the Kaureke was supposed to be located, but 

 they returned without having obtained the slightest trace of the ex- 

 istence of such an animal ; my son, however, expresses his belief in 

 the native accounts, and that if the creature no longer exists, its ex- 

 termination is of very recent date. 



In concluding this brief narrative of the discovery of a living ex- 

 ample of a genus of birds once contemporary with the colossal Moa, 

 and hitherto only known by its fossil remains, I beg to remark, that 

 this highly interesting fact tends to confirm the conclusions expressed 

 in my communications to the Geological Society, namely, that the 

 Dinornis, Palapteryx, and related forms, were coeval with some of 

 the existing species of birds peculiar to New Zealand, and that their 

 final extinction took place at no very distant period, and long after 

 the advent of the aboriginal Maoris. As my son at the date of his 

 last letter was about to depart on another exploration of the bone 

 deposits of the North Island, I indulge the hope that he will ere long 

 have the gratification of transmitting or bringing to England addi- 

 tional materials for the elucidation of the extinct and recent faunas of 

 New Zealand. 



\Yith much pleasure I resign to Mr. Gould the description of the 

 ornithological characters and relations of this, in every sense, rara 

 avis, from the Isles of the Antipodes. 



Chester Square, Pimlico, November 1, 1850. 



2. Remarks on Notornis Mantelli. By J. Gould, F.R.S. 



Dr. Man tell having kindly placed his son's valuable acquisition in 

 my hands for the purpose of characterizing it in the Proceedings of 

 the Society, and of afterwards figuring and describing it in the ap- 

 pendix to my work on the ' Birds of Australia,' I beg leave to com- 

 mence the pleasing task he has assigned to me. 



The amount of interest which attaches to the present remarkable 

 bird is perhaps greater than that which pertains to any other with 

 which I am acquainted, inasmuch as it is one of the few remaining 

 species of those singular forms which inhabited that supposed rem- 

 nant of a former continent — New Zealand, and which have been so 

 ably and so learnedly described, from their semi-fossilized remains, by 

 Professor Owen ; who, as well as the scientific world in general, can- 

 not fail to be highly gratified by the discovery of a recent example 

 of a form previously known to us solely from a few osteological frag- 

 ments, and which, but for this fortunate discovery, would in all pro- 

 bability, like the Dodo, have shortly become all but traditional. 

 While we congratulate ourselves upon the preservation of the skin, 

 we must all deeply regret the loss of the bones, any one of which 

 would have been in the highest degree valuable for the sake of com- 



