SR eR, EN ee a ie ba Lai a a TAN a Nl a Ia 
Sie enn tet 
Buiier.—On the Notornis. 241 
The characters of the genus Notornis were first determined by Professor 
Owen, in 1848, from certain fossil remains collected by Mr. Mantell in the 
North Island of New Zealand, and consisting of the skull, beaks, humerus, 
sternum, and other parts of the skeleton of a large brevipennate Rail. The 
sagacity with which the learned professor had interpreted these bones, and 
the absolute correctness of his prevision, were exemplified in the discovery 
which enabled Mr. Gould, in 1850, to communicate to the Zoological Society 
the complete generic characters of the bird, already known to science as 
Notornis mantelli, Owen. In illustration of these, Mr. Gould furnished to 
the society a coloured sketch of the head of Notornis, in his usual artistic 
style ; and at a later period he published, in the supplement to his ‘‘ Birds 
of Australia,” a full-sized drawing of the bird. These plates are very 
beautiful, but on a close comparison with the specimen to which these notes 
more especially refer, I find that some of the minor features have been 
overlooked by the artist, or sacrificed to pictorial effect. In the following 
descriptive notes, I have, therefore, deemed it best to record the characters 
(generic as well as specific) with some minuteness of detail. 
The bill is somewhat shorter than the head, greatly compressed on the 
sides, and much arched above, the culmen haying a convex or rounded 
aspect, with a uniform width of 2 of an inch from above the nostrils to 
within half an inch of the tip, when it rapidly diminishes, terminating in a 
rounded point. Where it merges into the frontal shield, the culmen is § 
of an inch in width. Gould has somewhat exaggerated in his drawings 
the angle of declination towards the corners of the mouth, also the serrated 
edge of the upper mandible. In this specimen there is only the slightest 
indication of pectination. The cutting edges of both mandibles are sharp 
to the touch. The horny covering of the bill rises on the forehead to a line 
with the posterior angle of the eye, forming a depressed frontal shield 
(not arched asin the drawing). Nostrils oval, placed in a depression near the 
base of the bill, and forming an oblique opening, nearly twice as large as 
shown in Gould’s sketch of the head (Proc. Zool. Soc.). Wings short, 
rounded, and slightly concave; ample in appearance, but useless for purposes 
of flight ; first quill shortest, second half an inch shorter than third; third 
fourth and fifth longest and about equal; sixth scarcely shorter than 
fifth. On examining the wing-feathers they are found to be feeble and 
pliant, the outer webs being almost as broad asthe inner. The tail-feathers 
are likewise soft and pliant, with disunited filaments, much worn at the tips. 
The tarsi are long, strong, and well proportioned to the bird; longer than 
the toes (exclusive of claws), rounded in form, and armed in front with 
fourteen more or less broad, regular, transverse scutelle, forming an 
effective shield ; on the middle toe there are twenty-three transverse scales, 
23 
