HuTTON. — 0)i a Siipposed Rib of the Kumi. 485 



Aet. XLI. — On a Supposed Bib of the Kumi, or Ngarara. 

 By Captain F. W. Hutton, F.E.S. 



[Read before the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, 5th October, 



1898.] 



Among the bones found in the Earnscleugh Cave, in Central 

 Otago, when it was cleared out for the Otago Museum Com- 

 mittee in 1874, was the ramus of a lower jaw of a pleurodont 

 lizard,* which may, provisionally, be supposed to belong to 

 the extinct kumi, or ngarara, of the Maoris.! This bone, 

 unfortunately, was not described, but, so far as I can remem- 

 ber, it was about the size of that of a tuatara. The denti- 

 tion, however, was decidedly pleurodont, and the teeth, I 

 think, were stronger than those of the Igumiidce. 



In a collection in the Canterbury Museum from the same 

 cave — received in exchange from the Otago Museum early in 

 1892 — I find what appears to be a si:nall vertebral rib, belong- 

 ing to the left side, and which may possibly have belonged to 

 the same animal. It may be the last cervical of a reptile, 

 although it seems to be too robust and too flattened for the 

 rib of a lizard. It more nearly resembles the first thoracic 

 rib of a mammal, but it does not appear to have been attached 

 to a costal cartilage, and the shape of the head and tuberosity 

 is different. It is, indeed, unlike anything known to me. 



It is much curved, robust, flattened distaily, and 

 with the inner edge of the flattened portion denti- 

 culate, as can be seen in the figure. There are 

 seven denticulations, six of which are very distinct. 

 There is a small but well-marked pointed tuberosity. 

 The apex of the shaft is oblique to the axis, sharp, 

 not flattened for the attachment of a cartilage or sternal 

 rib. The length, measured along the curve, is about 14 mm. ; 

 and the breadth at the commencement of the denticulations 

 is 2-75 mm. 



* Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. vii., p. 139. 



t Stack, Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. vii., p. 295. 



