THE ANNALS 



AND 



MAGAZINE OF NATURAL HISTORY. 



[SECOND SERIES.] 

 No. 39. MARCH 1851. 



XIY.—Note on some Bones and Eggs found at Madagascar, in 

 recent Alluvia, belonging to a gigantic Bird. By M. Isidorb: 

 Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire*. 



We received the day before yesterday from M. Malavois, a 

 planter in the Island of Reunion f, some objects of such great in- 

 terest, that we deem it a duty to submit them immediately to the 

 attention of the Academy. They prove the existence at Mada- 

 gascar, geologically recent, of a bird of gigantic size, new to sci- 

 ence, but with regard to which there existed, as will presently be 

 seen, some indications. 



The discovery of these objects was made, in 1850, by M. Aba- 

 die, captain of a merchantman. During a stay at Madagascar J, 

 M. Abadie one day observed, in the hands of a Madagascan, a 

 gigantic e^^, which the natives had perforated at one of its ex- 

 tremities, and which they employed for various domestic pur- 

 poses. The accounts which M. Abadie received from the Mada- 

 gascans soon led to the discovery of a second egg, of nearly the 

 same size, which was found, perfectly entire, in the bed of a tor- 

 rent, amongst the debris of a land-slip which had taken place a 

 short time previously. Not long afterwards was discovered, in 

 alluvia of recent formation, a third egg, and some bones, no less 

 gigantic, which were rightly considered as fossil, or rather, ac- 

 cording to an expression now generally adopted, as subfossil. All 

 these objects were immediately forwarded, unfortunately without 

 the necessary precautions, from Madagascar to the He de la 

 Reunion, and thence to Paris : one of the eggs arrived broken 

 into a multitude of fragments, but it can be restored ; the two 

 others are in a perfect state of preservation, 



* Translated from the Comptes Rendus for Jan. 27, 1851. 



t Commonly called Bourbon. — H. E. S. 



X On the south-west coast of the island, according to M. Malavois. It 

 will be seen hereafter that another egg has been discovered at the north- 

 west extremity of the island. 



Ann. Sf Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 2. Vol. vii. 11 



