172 M. de Quatrefages 07? 



IX. 



Hitherto, to my regret, I have had to oppose Dr. Haast. I 

 am only tlie more pleased to bear testimony to the incontest- 

 able services which he has rendered to science in solving 

 some of the most interesting questions which are raised by 

 the history of the Moas. From his investigations, equally 

 fertile and persevering, it appears that all the large and small 

 Brevipennes which have inhabited and still inhabit New 

 Zealand were contemporaneous. In exploring the alluvial 

 deposits and the marshes of Glenmark, the learned geologist 

 found, side by side, bones of AfAeryx and remains of the 

 largest and most curious species of Moas, just as with us the 

 bones of the mammoth and rhinoceros are found mixed with 

 those of the reindeer and the chamois*. 



As with us also, the extinction of the lost species did not 

 take place at the same time. If there are some which sur- 

 vived to the close of the eighteenth century, others perished 

 at more or less remote periods. Further researches, hitherto 

 too much neglected by the New-Zealand naturalists, will be 

 necessary to determine the succession of these extinctions ; 

 and in order to solve the many questions raised by this 

 problem, archaeology and geology must come to each other's 

 aid. Dr. Haast seems to me to be the only person who has 

 already collected some data upon this subject, and for this we 

 owe him our thanks f' 



From the surveys published by the eminent geologist it 

 appears that the bones of Dinornis giganteus have never been 

 met with among the remains of feasts in the vicinity of the 

 ancient ovens. The largest of birds would seem therefore to 

 have ceased to exist before the arrival of man in New Zealand. 

 Dr. Haast has only once found the remains of a Dinornis 

 robustus among the refuse of a kitchen. This species, little 

 inferior in size to the preceding, was probably near disap- 

 pearance when the hunters killed one of its last representa- 

 tives in Shag Valley. At Rakaia have been collected the 

 remains of three specimens of Palafpteryx ingens^ the bones 

 of which had been intentionally broken ; but this bird has 

 not been met with elsewhere. Palapteryx crassus has oc- 

 curred very abundantly at Shag Valley and Hakaia. Pala- 



* * Geology, Glenmark,' chap. xvi. (D), p. 442. Dr. Haast estimates 

 at over a thousand the number of Moas of which the remains have been 

 obtained from this locality, from which the greater part of the specimens 

 •which have enriched the museums of the whole world have been derived. 



t Address, p. 86 ; Third paper, p. 07 ; ' Researches in Sumner Moa- 

 Cave,' p. 86; ' On a Moa-Encampment,' p. 99. 



