﻿Hector, — Fossil Penguin. 343 



attachments of the bone with the scapula are well shown in figs. 2 and 3, and 

 far exceed in proportion the same parts in the recent bone. But, on the 

 whole, in this and all the other bones compared, there is a marked agreement 

 in structure and anatomical characters with those of the existing bird, the 

 chief differences being in the total and proportional measurements. 



3. Ulna. — There is only a fragment of the upper end of this bone, belonging 

 to the left side (PI. XVIII. fig. 6), which was found in the slab with its 

 articular surface applied to the corresponding posterior condyle of the humerus. 



4. Metacarpals. — On the surface of the slab the metacarpals of both wings 

 are exposed, but not cleared from the matrix. Their length is 3-5 inches, 

 and greatest width 1 -1 inch. It happens that in the Museum there is a beauti- . 

 fully preserved fossil bone, that was collected by Mr. C. Traill from the white 

 Kakanui limestone of Otago, and which the study of these remains led me 

 to recognise as the left metacarpal probably of the same species of Penguin, 

 though belonging to an individual of slightly larger dimensions, the total length 

 being 4 inches. This very perfect fossil has been figured (PI. XYII. fig. 3) 

 along with an outline of the corresponding bone of Eudyptes (fig. 4), which is 

 only 1-7 inches in lengLh. 



The Oamaru specimen possesses great interest, from its connecting the fossil 

 remains from the West Coast, which are under consideration, wiih a discovery 

 made by Professor Huxley in- 1857, who recognised from a single bone of the 

 foot (tarso-metatarse), which had been submitted to him by the Hon. W. B. D. 

 Mantell from the same formation that yielded Mr. Traill's specimen, that a 

 gigantic Penguin existed in New Zealand during the early tertiary period. 

 The bone described by Professor Huxley has been re-figured from his woodcut,* 

 along with the same bone of the Crested Penguin (PL XYII. figs. 5 and 6), 

 for comparison with the other bones of the fossil bird, of which we have now 

 fragments of probably three distinct specimens, unless, by some rare chance, 

 Mr. Traill's specimen, gathered many years later, should be part of the same 

 skeleton that Mr. Mantell's bone belonged to. As there is no reason for ascribing 

 the bones from the east and west coasts to different species, I propose to include 

 them under the name given by Professor Huxley — Palaeeudyptes antarcticus. 



In forming this new genus Professor Huxley states that the fossil bone 

 he described approximates most to the characters of the Crested Penguin 

 (Eudyptes)., the skeleton of which I have used in the foregoing comparisons, 

 but that it indicated the former existence of a bird twice as tall and massive 

 as the largest existing species of this genus, and probably from 4 to 5 feet 

 high. From the comparisons I have been able to make with the larger series 

 of bones now obtained, I am convinced that this estimate is rather under than 

 over the size of the extinct bird. 



* " Quart. Jour. Geol. Soc," XV., 672. 



