274 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



it was a bird, and others a person. All agreed that it was called 

 a Moa; that in general appearance it somewhat resembled an 

 immense domestic cock, with the difference, however, of its having 

 a ' face like a man's ' ; that it lived on air, and that it was attended 

 or guarded by two immense Tuataras, who, Argus-like, kept 

 incessant watch while the Moa slept. Also, that if any one 

 ventured to approach the dwelling of this wonderful creature, he 

 would be invariably trampled on and killed by it." " A mountain 

 named Whakapunaki, at least eighty miles distant in a southerly 

 direction, was spoken of as the residence of this creature ; here, 

 however, only one existed, which, it was generally contended, 

 was the sole survivor of the Moa race. Yet they could not assign 

 any possible reason why it should have become all but extinct." 

 " While, however, the existence of the Moa was universally 

 believed (in fact, to dare to doubt of such a being amounted, in 

 the native estimation, to a veiy high crime), no one person could be 

 found who had ever seen it." " Many of the natives, however, 

 had from time to time seen very large bones, larger, from their 

 account, than those of an ox ; these bones they cut up into small 

 pieces for the purpose of fastening to their fish-hooks as a lure, 

 instead of the Haliotis shell." 



Other Europeans have been told this same myth, and other 

 high mountains have been designated as the dwelling-place of 

 this strange creature. It is hardly necessary to add, however, 

 that subsequent explorations have failed to reveal the hiding- 

 place of " the last Moa," and that we owe our entire knowledge 

 of the bird to the study of its fossil remains. These have been 

 found in many places and under varying conditions. 



According to Dr. Haast: — "The oldest beds containing Moa 

 bones are proved to belong to the great glacier period, where they 

 occur in morainic accumulations and silt beds, as well as in 

 fluviatile deposits, formed by rivers having issued from the terminal 

 face of gigantic glaciers during that period. Here they have 

 been traced as low as one hundred feet below the surface. In 

 the loess deposits they are also of frequent occurrence, where 

 their existence has been proved to a depth of more than fifty feet. 

 Advancing to the quaternary period, Moa bones are found in 

 turbary deposits, or in silt or loess on the plains or lower hills, in 

 caves and in fissures of rocks ; in fact, everywhere where favourable 

 conditions for their preservation prevailed." 



