ROOM II. GEOLOGY OP NEW ZEALAND. 95 



evidences are a bone very little fossilized, which was brought 

 from New Zealand by Mr. Rule to Mr. Gray, and by him sent 

 to Professor Richard Owen. I possess drawings of similar 

 bones, and of what may possibly be a claw of the same bird, 

 which are in the possession of the Rev. R. Taylor, of Waimate. 

 They were found on the east coast of the North Island, and 

 were brought down by rivulets from a neighbouring mountain 

 called Hikorangi." 1 



In 1843, a collection, comprising vertebrae, and bones of 

 the hinder extremities, pelvis, &c., were transmitted by the 

 Rev. W. Williams to the Dean of Westminster, (Dr. Buck- 

 land ;) and in 1846 many specimens were sent to England by 

 Dr. Mackellar, Mr. Percy Earle, and Colonel Wakefield. 

 These were placed in the hands of Professor Owen, and form 

 the subject of his first and second " Memoirs on the Dinornis," 

 in the "Zoological Transactions," Vol. III., in which the 

 genera Dinornis, Palapteryx, <fcc., were established. 



In 1846 and 1847, my eldest son, Mr. Walter Mantell, of 

 Wellington, who had resided several years in the colony, 

 explored every known locality of these fossil bones within his 

 reach, in the North Island ; and went into the interior of the 

 country, and located with the natives, for the purpose of 

 collecting specimens, and of ascertaining whether any of these 

 gigantic birds were still in existence ; resolving, if there 

 appeared to be the least chance of success, to penetrate into 

 the unfrequented regions, and obtain a live Moa. The infor- 

 mation gathered from the natives offered no encouragement 

 to follow up the pursuit, but tended to confirm the idea that 

 this race of colossal bipeds was extinct ; the last individuals 

 having, in all probability, like the Dodo, been exterminated 

 by human agency, within a comparatively recent period : or 

 that if any of the species whose bones occur in a fossil state 

 are still living, they will prove to be of comparatively small 

 types related to the Apteryx, the living diminutive represen- 

 tative of the stupendous ostrich-like birds which once trod 

 the soil of New Zealand. 



My son succeeded, however, in forming the most interesting 

 collection of these remains hitherto obtained. It comprised 

 between seven and eight hundred bones belonging to birds of 



1 " Travels in New Zealand," vol. ii. p. 195. 



