146 PROFESSOR OWEN ON THE GENUS DINORNIS. 
Towards the north end of the bay a small brook discharges itself, from a swamp at the 
foot of the hills in the rear: and at the mouth of the brook a short range of downs 
runs along the beach to the southward, presenting a line of earthy cliffs, wasting away 
and forming the shore as they fall down by the washing of the sea at the foot. These 
cliffs are about from twenty-five to thirty feet in height, and nearly perpendicular. 
The upper stratum of the cliffs is formed of sand, and is about three feet in thickness, 
producing the usual arenaceous shrubs, grasses, &c. Underneath, the line of demar- 
cation being very distinct, is a thick stratum or bed of sandy earth, sand predominating: 
out of this substratum, about fifty or sixty yards south of the mouth of the brook, the 
Moa’s bones were exposed, projecting, in consequence of a late falling away of that 
part of the cliff in which they were imbedded: they lay a foot or more beneath the 
upper surface of the substratum. At the same spot there was a ‘ kapura maori,’ or 
native cooking fireplace, dug into the surface of the substratum, and full of stones that 
had been once heated (to convey the heat to the food laid upon them),—and left, just as 
similar cooking-places are left at the present day by the natives ;—about two feet from 
which lay the bones. Close to the fireplace, and similarly imbedded, were bones of 
smaller birds, and of fishes similar to those found at present in the sea adjacent; all, 
including those of the Moa, having been evidently the remains of the food cooked 
here at a former period and eaten, as my native attendant remarked, by the then native 
inhabitants. A part of a leg bone, about two feet in length, apparently belonging to 
the same leg as this femur’,—the bone having been broken near the middle (probably 
in order to be placed more conveniently over the fireplace), was also found close to the 
femur: 
«The antiquity of these remains can only be arrived at by inference. How long it is 
since the superficial stratum of sand now exhibited at the top of the cliffs overlooking 
— i ee Se ee a= == a 
— 5 
the sea, was formed by water and winds, is a matter of induction for the geologist. 
The sea is now undoing, and claiming the privilege of, former lacustrine or marine 
' Jt accords with the size of the tibia of tue Dinornis gracilis.—R. O. 
