144 ANIMALS OF THE PAST 
with much to support it, that the big birds — 
were eaten off the face of the earth by an ear- 
lier race than the Maoris, and that after the © 
extirpation of the Moas the craving for flesh — 
naturally led to cannibalism. But by whom- — 
soever the destruction was wrought, the result — 
was the same, the habitat of these feathered — 
giants knew them no longer, while multitudes — 
of charred bones, interspersed with fragments — 
of eggshells, bear testimony to former barbaric — 
feasts. | i 
It is a far cry from New Zealand to Mada- 7 
gascar, but thither must we go, for that island } 
was, pity we cannot say is, inhabited by a 
race of giant birds from whose eggs it has been — 
thought may have been hatched the Roc of ~ 
Sindbad. Arabian tales, as we all know, lo- 
cate the Roc either in Madagascar or in some — 
adjacent island to the north and east, and it is ~ 
far from unlikely that legends of the Aupyor- — 
nis, backed by the substantial proof of its 
enormous eggs, may have been the slight | 
foundation of fact whereon the story-teller 
erected his structure of fiction. True, the Roc — 
of fable was a gigantic bird of prey capable of : 
