MADAGASCAR AND NEW ZEALAND. 239 



of the egg of the largest species*. What prodigious strength must have been 

 necessary in the young bird to enable it to burst forth when ready to be 

 hatched ! It is possible that a very strong temporary sheath was furnished 

 to the tip of the beak for this purpose. 



In Col. Henry Yule's fine work, ' The Book of Ser Marco Polo the 

 Venetian,' 1st edit. vol. ii. pp. 349 & 350, we have some account of the 

 " Rukh"f ; and he says : — "The circumstance which for the time localized 

 the Rukh in the direction of Madagascar was, perhaps, some rumour of 

 the great fossil JEpyornis, and its colossal eggs found in that island." 



However this may be, I must here express my opinion that the Rukh, 

 Rue, or Roc never had any thing to do with the Mpyornis. The Roc, if any 

 thing (and I think it was something), clearly appears to have been a bird of 

 flight, which the JEpyornis certainly was not ; neither was it a bird of prey, 

 as is proved by the bones. 



To clip the wings of the Roc is to un-Roc him. "What, then, was the 

 Roc ? Have we any knowledge of enormous powers of flight in a fossil 

 raptor ? We have, in Harpagornis moorei'l, lately discovered in IS ew Zealand ; 

 and it is not impossible that some other gigantic raptor may turn up in 

 Madagascar, which, with plenty of exaggeration, may be the origin of the Roc. 

 Such should be looked for ; but, in any case, Mpyornis was not the Roc. 



The fine illustrations of the bones of JEpyornis with which M. Milne- 

 Edwards and M. Grandidier have accompanied their article are most valuable. 



* M. Milne-Edwards and M. Grandidier mention one specimen, on the authority of 

 M. Sganzin, the greater axis of which was pierced by a stick in order that it might be used 

 to crush rice. 



t Col. Yule has figured one of the eggs of ^. maximus, now in the British Museum. This 

 illustration does not appear in his second edition. The artist seems to have made the specimen too 

 pointed. 



X Cf. papers by Prof. Owen ; also Dr. Julius Haast's article on the extinct genus Harpagornis, 

 Trans. New-Zeal. Inst. vol. vi. p. 62. 



VOL. III. 2 M 



