362 PKOFESSOE, OWEN ON THE GENUS DINORNIS. 



in the bones of the six kinds of New-Zealand wingless birds defined in my first Memoir', 

 that I presumed to express such conclusion in the usual way of specific denominations. 

 On the same grounds were defined four other species in the second Memoir ^ 



As I have already noted, I had had the satisfaction of seeing the characters repeated 

 in more than one specimen of femui-, tibia, and metatarsus of eight out of those ten 

 species, in most of them by several bones. Of Dinornis casuarinus, for example, in the 

 year 1846, I had had under inspection ten femora, eleven tibiae, and six metatarsi. I 

 had thus been able, in acquisitions received subsequently to the date of the above-cited 

 Memoirs, to refer bones to species therein characterized and figured. 



If in time to come other observers and collectors of avian remains in New Zealand be 

 able to match the bones with those which I have described and figured as the types of 

 extinct species oi Dinornis, in the way and degree, e.g., in which it has been done by 

 the acute and experienced naturalist and Government Geologist of Canterbury Province 

 in the case of the rich depository of dinornithic remains in Glenmark Swamp ^ all 

 reasonable scepticism will in the end give way. 



But I work strongly impressed with the duty of making due and suitable return for 

 the opportunities liberally afforded me of examining and comparing the specimens 

 collected in New Zealand, by giving figures of the natural size of aU such as typify 

 species. This is the essential foundation of the work of recognizing the already defined 

 species, and of diflerentiating additional kinds of the extinct birds of New Zealand. 



On this ground I proceed to describe a pelvis, femur, tibia, and metatarsus of a 

 Dinornis which comes under the latter category, and to ascribe it to a Dinornis gravis, 

 from the weight of the bird relatively to its bulk, as indicated by the proportions of the 

 bones of the hind limbs. 



I begin with the metatarsus (PI. LVIII.), as this bone usually yields the best charac- 

 teristics of the kind of Moa to which it belonged. 



In length it comes nearest to the metatarsus of Dinornis cassuarinus^, in breadth to 

 that of Dinornis crassus^ ; it is, however, shorter by half an inch than the former, and 

 broader by five lines than the latter ; and as Dinornis crassiis was diS'erentiated from 

 Din. casuarinus by the greater relative breadth of the metatarsus, this difl'erential cha- 

 racter applies still more strongly to the present species, inasmuch as the entire bone is 

 shorter than that of Dinornis casuarinus, instead of being longer as is the metatarsus 

 of Dinornis crassus. 



The length of the metatarsus in Dinornis gravis is 7 inches 9 lines, the least breadth 

 of the shaft is 2 inches 1 line, the breadth of the proximal end is 3 inches 2 lines or 

 o inches 3 lines, that of the distal end is 4 inches 2 lines, the thickness or antero- 

 posterior diameter of the middle of the shaft is 1 inch, its circumference is 5 inches. 



' Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. iii. p. 235. - Tom. cit. p. 344 (1S4G). 



' Haast, " On the Measurements of Dinornis Bones from a Swamp at Glenmark,"' in Transactions of the 

 New-Zealand Institute, p. 80. 8vo. Wellington, 1869. 



' Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. iii. pi. 48. fig. 3. ' Tom. cit. pi. 48. fig. 4. 



