ON DROMORNIS AUSTRALIS.—APPENDIX. 47 
and boulders, on one of which (at that depth) rested a short 
thick femur, so filled in with mineral matter, eale spar, and iron 
ites, as to give the internal structure more the appearance of 
a reptilian than an ornithic bone. I have never yet seen any 
bone in Australia so much mineralized and yet retaining its dis- 
tinctive osseous features. When placed in my hands it 
already Sarg a in two, just as a bird’s bones would be likely to 
break. t besides this, there are two crushed-in fractures of 
ancien — which have broken in the surface of the bone, and 
if not made in the life-time of the bird, deo probably made by 
the violence of the heavy drift in which it was foun 
T had an opportunity of comparing it hastily at et Australian 
Museum, in company of Mr. Gerard Krefft, our wr Curator, 
and was convinced of its being a bird bone, allied t NOT Ni 
to which opinio was afterwards re saunas to the 
writings of Professor Owen. Since then Mr. refft has com- 
— it with a collection sent over from aa Zealand, by Dr. 
and has — enabled to determine it to be a bone be- 
areal to Dinorn 
I take sence of t he departure of the mail to-morrow to 
announce this fact, jeaihil for a further account of the specimen 
from Mr. Krefft. 
The Peak Downs were ert ete Leichhardt, in his famous 
expedition to Port Essington in 
Since then the district has ees Laine by Mr. Gregory, to 
_ whose journal as well as to that of Leichhardt your readers are 
refe 
The Peak Downs are now settled, and a considerable popula- 
tion has been digging gold on Theresa Creek and in other places, 
and mining for ae has made advances to the westward at 
Mount Drummon 
elle d Tertiary, but that ton were pebhles of probably 
ulation, consisting of Silurian, Carboniferous, 
and Secondary rocks, with the a 9 rocks of the nei ighbour- - 
hood, which latter may be in part of T 
Fig sg of the creeks running more to the sou th-oabeatd from 
the Peak Downs, and like resa Creek, belong 
