PROFESSOR OWEN ON THE GENUS DINORNIS. 163 
coalesced coccygeals in birds of flight, for the support of the rectrices, or steering quill- 
feathers of the tail. 
The cranium is six inches eight lines in length ; three inches nine lines across the 
broadest part, behind the orbits. The post-orbital process is broad, compressed, and 
descends nearly to the zygomatic arch. The upper mandible is slightly deflected, 
conical, obtusely pointed, with the external nostrils terminating at the distance of about 
an inch from the apex of the premaxillary. The upper part of the’median nasal process 
of this bone, together with the nasals, has been broken away. The minor characters 
of the cranium and of the lower mandible accord generically with those of the Dinornis, 
described in the present volume of the ‘Transactions of the Zoological Society,’ 
pp. 60-65. The chief peculiarity of the skull in the present species is its small size, as 
contrasted with the pelvis and hind limbs. 
The characters of the bones of the leg and foot of the Dinornis elephantopus have been 
described in a preceding memoir, and need not here be repeated. 
The keel-less sternum, in its shortness, breadth, and subquadrate form ; in the two 
wide and deep posterior notches; in the unusually small and shallow coracoid fosse ; 
and in the reduction of the articular pits on the costal borders to three on each side, 
closely conforms to the type of that instructive bone, in the Palapterye (Dinornis), 
described in the fourth volume of the ‘ Transactions of the Zoological Society,’ 
Pps Lo: 
I have refrained from entering into closer descriptive details of the skeleton of the 
Dinornis elephantopus, because only the plates can convey an adequate idea of its extra- 
ordinary proportions to those who have not seen the original itself. 
The specimen, as now articulated, stands in the first compartment of the Paleontological 
Gallery of the British Museum. The articulated hind-limbs of the Dinornis (robustus) 
are placed on each side, as in Pl. XLVII., to illustrate the characteristic proportions of 
the two extinct species. 
The drawings from which the plates have been engraved were taken from two 
successful photographic views, corrected, as to the relative size of the parts, from the 
skeleton itself: I am much indebted for the care and skill which Mr. Erxleben has 
bestowed on this complex subject. 
The bones which have served for the réconstruction of the skeleton of the Dinornis 
elephantopus were selected from the large collection obtained by Mr. Commissioner 
Mantell, in the Middle Island of New Zealand, at the locality (Ruamoa, Middle Island 
of New Zealand) and under the circumstances described in the preceding memoir. 
