342 



remembered, as exhibited by the Ostrich, Cassowary and Apteryx, there 

 will appear but little reason in inferring that the descriptions and figures 

 of the extinct brevipennate Dodo of the Isle of Mauritius were fabulous, 

 because the upper mandible was hooked at the tip as in the Vultures, 

 and the entire beak compressed and resembling upon the whole more 

 that of the Raptorial than the known existing Struthious birds. 



Presented by the Rev. Dr. Buckland, F.M.S. 



Genus Dinomis*. 



The following specimens of great extinct Wingless Birds of the genus Dinor- 

 nis are from the beds of small rivers descending from the mountains into 

 Poverty Bay, Wairoa, New Zealand. They were transmitted by the Rev. W. 

 Williams to Dr. Buckland and by him presented to the College. 



1552. The cranial portion of the skull of a Dinornis, apparently Dinornis 

 struthoides, Owen. It is remarkably depressed, very broad, subquadrate, 

 in size and shape most like the corresponding part of the head of the 

 Dodo, but gently and equably convex above, the cerebral hemispheres 

 not raising their bony covering above the level of the rest of the cal- 

 varium, as in the Dodo, and the frontal region, though more elevated 

 than in the existing Struthious birds, is apparently less suddenly raised 

 than in the Dodo. The length of the present fossil is three inches, 

 its greatest breadth three inches and a quarter, but the prominent parts 

 of the sides of the skull are broken away : its breadth between the 

 temporal fossa?, which are large and deep, is two inches five lines: its 

 vertical diameter at the deepest part, from the upper occipital ridge to 

 the under surface of the basi-sphenoid, is one inch and a half. The 

 great occipital foramen is subcircular, and seven lines in diameter ; its 

 plane is vertical, and the single occipital condyle projects more freely 

 backwards than in other birds beyond the upper margin of the hole, from 

 which the occipital surface of the skull slopes forwards as it rises to join 

 the upper surface. This inclination, with the slight depth and great 



* ?eivbs surprising, opi'ts bird. 



