On the Extinct Birds of New Zealand. 209 



XXV. — Remarks on the Extinct Birds of New Zealand. 

 By Julius Haast, Ph.D., F.R.S.^ 



I HAVE hitherto refrained from publishing any of my notes 

 on the researches made during a number of years upon the 

 accumulated treasures obtained in the turbary deposits of 

 Glenmark, except a list of measurements of leg-bones of dif- 

 ferent species in the first volume of our ' Transactions/ and 

 the description of the bones of the remarkable genus Harpa- 

 gornis, in vol. iv., always expecting that Professor Owen, 

 whose truly classical labours have laid the foundations of the 

 edifice to which present and future researches will only form 

 additions, would himself review the whole subject at length. 



Finding, however, that, instead of doing so, that illustrious 

 comparative anatomist is inclined to unite, as it were, all the 

 principal species with a struthious character into one genus 

 under the general term of Dinornis, dropping altogether the 

 name Palapteryx, I feel that I should not do my duty if I 

 were to hold back the following notes any longer. 



If it were our good fortune that Professor Owen could have 

 access to the rich material which is exhibited in the Canter- 

 bury Museum, I am sure he would never have united under 

 one genus a number of species which show such a remarkable 

 diversity of character ; but as his description of single bones 

 of some species, or at most of portions only of others, were 

 given during a considerable space of time, ranging over more 

 than thirty years, I can easily understand that Professor 

 Owen will find every day, as the material increases, greater 

 difficulty in making himself acquainted with all the details, 

 without having access to as complete a series as we possess in 

 the Canterbury Museum for reference. Such a series would 

 have afforded him at a glance a confirmation that the new 

 arrangement which I venture to propose in the following 

 notes, is not based altogether upon unsound principles. 



I am well aware that there are still many naturalists who 

 think that the division of the bones of our extinct avifauna 



* Reprinted from Dr. Haast's Presidential Address to the Philosophical 

 Institute of Canterbury, New Zealand, delivered March 5th, 1874. 



