106 Transactions.— Miscellaneous. 
bird."* This, however, is widely different, both as to date (of his first 
sending to Professor Owen), and also as to the extent of his « find ” at the 
East Cape. He only specifies the, so-called, **toe," which is quite correct, 
as I had myself stated in my early published paper ;+ he says nothing here, 
however, of **the fragment of bone ; nevertheless, he goes much further— 
actually saying that ** he had found bones in that same kind of stratum at East 
Cape and at Poverty Bay!” All I can say is: If so, why did he not make 
them known? Mr. Taylor was well-known not to be at all backward in 
writing of every thing; and while at the North he had plenty of time to 
call his own. In this same letter to Professor Owen, (supra), Mr. Taylor 
goes on to say: “ The Kakapo or Tarepo is about the size of a turkey, and 
from its habits, nature, and other circumstances, seems so closely to resemble 
the Dodo, as to lead me to suppose it is the same,” etc. 8. I well remember 
Mr. Taylor (with whom I was for some time on the most intimate terms of 
friendship), complimenting me highly on his receiving that part of the 
“ Tasmanian Journal of Science" containing my paper on the Moa. 
[Those parts came regularly through my hands for distribution to the 
members residing in New Zealand, owing to my living near to the anchor- 
age.] Whenever Mr. Taylor came from the Waimate to the Day, he always , 
called, and saw repeatedly all my collections, from which he obtained many 
specimens. Briefly reviewing the past, I cannot but conclude that Mr. 
Taylor’s memory must have failed him when he gave his last statement at 
Wellington, in 1872, in which, I think, many incidents of the past relative 
to the Moa, are jumbled together as to date and sequence ; which, also, 
from the Editor’s note attached, seems to have been done rather hurriedly. 
At present I make no further remark concerning the many strange (? erro- 
neous) statements with which his published works on New Zealand abound ; 
on a future occasion, however, I may have to notice some of them. 
4. Of a remark made by Mr. Vaux, in his paper, ** On the probable origin 
of the Maori race." 
* “ Zoological Transactions,” Vol. III., part 4, p. 327. 
t Vide * Tasmanian Journal," Vol. IL, p. 85; and Dr. Dieffenbach also saw it. At 
that time, and for several years before and after, I was residing at Paihia in the Bay of 
Islands, while Mr. Taylor's home was at the Waimate, then a long day's journey inland. 
io match his “toe” (or claw) to my few bones of the Moa, but it would not fit; at that 
time Mr. Taylor had none, neither had Mr. Williams. The so-called * toe," which was 
very black and solid, resembled a bit of water-worn and rolled Obsidian more than any- 
thing else; yet it might have been a claw; but, if so, greatly worn, and with dull and 
rounded edges. I only saw it once and for a short time. 
1 Asa proof of this, see “Tasmanian Journal of Science,” Vol. IL, p. 244, for an 
. account of a fine fossil Terebratula (T. tayloriana), which I discovered far away in the 
interior in 1841, and dedicated to him, 
