122 PETRIFACTIONS AND THEIR TEACHINGS. CHAP. II. 



that of the Rhea or Cassowary ; the third is marked with 

 delicate interrupted linear grooves. The sculpturing in these 

 two species is distinct from that observable on any of the 

 eggs of existing struthionidee with which I have been able to 

 compare them. 



Fossil Eggs from Madagascar. As intimately connected 

 with this subject, I am induced to append the following 

 notice of a recent discovery in Madagascar of eggs of enor- 

 mous magnitude : 



" In a Report to the French Academic des Sciences, 

 M. Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire described three enormous fossil 

 eggs from Madagascar, and some bones belonging to the same 

 bird. The captain of a merchant vessel trading to Mada- 

 gascar, one day observed a native using for a domestic purpose 

 a vase which much resembled an egg, and upon examination 

 proved to be one. The native stated that many such were 

 to be found in the interior of the island, and eventually pro- 

 cured the eggs and bones exhibited by M. St. Hilaire. The 

 largest of these eggs is equal in bulk to 135 hens' eggs, and 

 will hold two gallons of water. M. St. Hilaire proposes 

 the name of Epiornis for the monster biped of which these 

 marvellous eggs and bones are the first evidence brought 

 under the notice of naturalists." * 



APTORNIS. (A. otidiformis). Table-Case 16. (Lign. 30.) 

 Among the bones collected by Mr. Walter Mantell from the 

 ossiferous deposit at Te Rangatapu, and transmitted to me in 

 1847, there were femora, a tibia and fibula, and several tarso- 

 metatarsals, of a cursorial bird, to which he directed special 

 attention, because he thought the latter strikingly resembled 

 the corresponding bones of the Dodo. Upon allowing Prof. 

 Owen the use of my son's collection as soon as it arrived, 

 the metatarsals in question were recognised as belonging to 

 a species of Dinornis established in 1843, from a tibia and 

 femur sent over by the Rev. W. Williams, and named D. 

 otidiformis? 



In the " Memoir on the Ornithic Remains discovered by Mr. 

 Walter Mantell at Waingonyoro" (Zool. Trans, vol. iii. p. 

 345), these specimens are alluded to in the following terms : 



"There are not fewer than 190 phalanges of the toes, refer- 



1 Athenaeum, March 22, 1851. 2 Zool. Trans, vol. iii. PL xxv. xxvi. 



