OSTEOLOGY OF BIRDS 



337 



In not a few instances these fossils when first discovered puzzled 

 not a little their examiners, and it has been no uncommon thing to 

 refer them to groups to which they by no means belonged. For 

 instance, 1 have mentioned above the Cnemiornis c o 1 c i t r a n s 

 of the Pleistocene of New Zealand. It was first recognized by 

 isolated bones that came to light. Sir Richard Owen pronounced - 

 upon its tibia, all that he had I believe, and relegated it to the 

 Moas. Parker fell in with the sternum, and he claimed that it 

 belonged to a great rail, or some ralline form. When the skull 

 came to hand, however, as it did later on, these palaeontological 

 guesses ceased, for the bird beyond all question was a goose. 



We now come to consider an entirely distinct family of anserine 

 birds, that has long been extinct and now known only through the 

 fossil remains of its representatives. I refer to the Gastornithidae. 

 These are arrayed in the following manner in Sharpe's Hand-List 

 of Birds [i 1230]. 



Order XXI Gastornithiformes 



Family 1 Gastornithidae. Lydekker. Cat. Foss. B. 1891. p. 357. 

 I Gastornis Hebert. Lydekker, loc. cit. p. 357. 



1 paristensis Hebert [Lydekker, p. 357] France (Lower Eocene). 



2 klaasscni E. T. Newton [Lydekker, p. 358] England (Lower 



Eocene). 



3 edwardsi Lemoine [Lydekker, p. 358] France (Lower Eocene). 

 II Dasornis Owen. Lydekker, loc. cit. p. 359. 



1 londinensis. Owen [Lydekker, p. 359] England (Eocene). 



III Rimiornis Lemoine. Lemoine, Rech. Ois. Foss. Rheims, 1881. 



2: 158. 



1 minor [Lydekker p. 360] France (Lower Eocene). 



IV Diatryma Cope. [Cope, Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila. Proc. 1876. p. 10]. 

 1 gigantea Cope [loc. cit. p. 2] New Mexico, Eocene. 



V Macrornis Seeley. Seeley, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (3) 1866. 18: no. 

 1 tanaupus Seeley [loc. cit.] England (Upper Eocene). 



Gastornis was named after its discoverer M. Gaston Plante, who 

 it is said first found the fossil bones of this gigantic and extinct 

 anserine fowl in the Paris basin, embedded in the conglomerate over- 

 lying the plastic clays. G. paristensis when in existence 

 was as big as an ostrich, and a number of palaeontologists believed 

 its nearest relatives were among the struthious birds, -a very com- 

 mon error for them to fall into, as all ancient birds possessed what 

 are thoughtlessly termed " ostrich characters." Even Marsh 

 thought the big diver Hesperornis to be an ostrich. When A. 

 Milne-Edwards, however, came to examine the material, he very 

 correctly placed Gastornis among the Anseres where it undoubtedly 

 belongs. 



