476 DISTRIBUTION IN SPACE AND TIME 



minated by the Maoris. The largest form (Dinornis maximus) 

 attained a height of over 1 1 feet. Another sort of Moa (Pachy- 

 ornis elephant opus , fig. 1335), though not so large as this, was 

 much more massive in build. Egg-shells and feathers of these 

 birds have been found, as well as skeletons. The bones and 

 egg-shells of other large running birds (/Epyornis] have been 

 abundantly discovered in Madagascar, and it is not unlikely 

 that they too owed their extinction to human agency. Some 

 species were little inferior in size to trie largest Moas. It is 

 not improbable that the creation of the fabulous bird known as 

 a "roc", which figures in the Arabian Nights and other Eastern 

 stories, was originally based upon ancient traditions regarding 

 some of the extinct running birds. 



At the present time such birds are limited to the soutnern 

 hemisphere, but we know that during early Kainozoic times they 

 also existed in the northern half of both Old and New Worlds. 



