124: Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



The bottom of the lagoon is lined about 1 foot thick with a fine whitish 

 clay, very soft, and somewhat elastic. 



In streaks and patches in this clay a red substance occurs at from 1 to 3 

 inches in thickness. 



The red streaks could be traced to the spring where, from top to bottom, 

 everything was discoloured with it. 



Through the rim of the basin, on the north-west quarter, there has been an 

 outlet, within 1 foot, as deep as the deepest part of the lagoon. 



This outlet is filled with peat from top to bottom, showing plainly that the 

 lagoon had an outlet, but no inlet can be found. 



It appears to me that the basin must have been formed whilst it was yet 

 under water near the shore of a great lake. 



The spring water rising would not have allowed the precipitation of the fine 

 particles which form the blue clay in which the basin is situated, and when the 

 lake receded it cut its outlet to the lowest ground. 



The bones were deposited principally in the north-east part of the lagoon, 

 on a space exactly the shape of a half-moon, 40 feet from point to point, 18 

 feet across the centre, and varying from 2 to 4 feet deep. Out of this small 

 space there were, when packed, 7 tons weight, and if half be allowed for 

 packing material, it would leave 3J tons of bones, and we judged that about 

 half were thrown away as being too much decayed for any practical use. 

 They lay in every imaginable complication of tangle, which Captain Hutton 

 most comprehensively described by saying, " There is no bone on the top." 

 The greater part of them were so completely decayed that it would be im- 

 j)ossible to make even an approximate estimation of the number of birds that 

 had fallen in this place, and centuries must have passed whilst they were in 

 course of accumulation. However, Mr. Edmonds and myself consulted on the 

 matter, and concluded that there could not have been less than 400. 



There were no bones of young birds near the top of the deposit. This I 

 will account for hereafter. 



There were also a large number of bones that had been broken and healed. 

 Also a considerable number of the extinct goose (Cnemiornis), a few of the 

 eagle {Ilarpagornia), a few reptiles, several of different species of small birds, 

 and a single jawbone of a rat. A disease of the foot appeared to have been 

 very prevalent amongst them, as a great number of the joints presented 

 unmistakable indications of rot, so much so that some of the toe joints had 

 even grown together. On the whole they were in every stage of decay, from 

 sound bones down to bone-dust, sound on the top, and the deeper the more 

 decayed. 



In the north-east part of the lagoon, close to the edge, in the very shallowest 



