﻿102 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



to the recent occurrence of the Moa is the neck of a Dinornis discovered iu 

 Otago, with portions of the skin partly covered with feathers still attached by 

 shrivelled muscles and ligaments. Hitherto, however, we have not heard in 

 what position this neck was found, but I may observe that the skeleton of 

 Dinornis rohustus excavated near Tiger Hill, on the Manuherikia plains, was 

 found to possess also portions of skins, feathers, and ligaments, attached to the 

 bones in exactly the same manner, although lying fourteen feet below the 

 ground. Moreover, the important fact, which we must not overlook, that 

 portions of tliat Tiger Hill skeleton were in the semi-fossil condition in which 

 moa bones usually are preserved to us, is in itself sufficient evidence, that 

 from the occurrence of another well preserved portion we cannot altogether 

 judge correctly as to the recentness of these remains. 



Dr. Hector himself, in a letter to Professor Owen, dated 15th February, 

 18G4, as printed in the "Transactions of the Zoological Society," when giving 

 him a description of the geological features of the ground where the Tiger Hill 

 skeleton was found, expresses himself as follows : — " The dry climate and the 

 fact that the bones were imbedded in dry sand, prevent our necessarily infer- 

 ring from the well-preserved condition of this skeleton, that it is of more recent 

 date than the bones that are usually found ; and, moreover, as some parts of 

 the skeleton are quite as much decomposed as the generality of the moa 

 remains, it is more natural to suppose that the preservation of the more perish- 

 able parts of the remainder of the skeleton has been due to an accidentally 

 favourable position of the soil." 



I fully agree with this conclusion, and I wish to point out that u.nder 

 favourable conditions, even h\ tertiary rocks, similar organic remains have been 

 preserved. Thus in the paper coal of the brown coal beds of Rhenish Prussia, 

 which are of miocene age, feathers of birds have been discovered, which shows 

 that under exceptionally favourable circumstances oi-ganic substances can be 

 preserved, which otherwise perish in a very short time. 



That the neck of the Moa, now in the Colonial Museum, which is in a 

 similar remarkable state of preservation as the Tiger Hill skeleton, was once 

 imbedded in micaceous sand, is stated by Dr. Hector himself. We are, there- 

 fore, not too bold to assume that it has been excavated from a bed similar to 

 that in which the last-mentioned skeleton was found. 



However, to my mind, one of the main arguments in favour of the great 

 antiquity of the moa ovens, from which we may conclude also of the long 

 extinction of the Dinornis species, is given by Dr. Hector when relating the 

 interesting discovery of the two steatite dishes carved in Maori fashion, of 

 which one was found near an old Maori oven at the coast and the other far in 

 the interior. 



This fact proves beyond a doubt that the natives had reliable traditions for 



