FOXTON-PIRBY : EXTINCTION OP THE DINORNIS. 243 



retired to the north, step by step, until they found the limits of their exist- 

 ence in the tundra of I^orthern Siberia. This view is supported by the fact, 

 that the " collared lemming," Lemmus torquatus, at present existing in the 

 highest north beyond the forest region, is now only found (fossil), in the 

 ossiferous fissures of ISTorthern Germany, but never further south. 



The most remarkable case of extinction, within our own time, however, 

 is that of the dinornis, or gigantic moa of JSTew Zealand. The Dinornis, 

 (Gr. deinos^ wonderful ; oniis, a bird,) belongs to a genus of large bKds of 

 the tribe Brevipennes ; and many bones belonging to birds of this class have 

 been found in New Zealand, not only in the most recent deposits, but in the 

 sand by the sea-shore, in caves, in swam|)s, in the soil of forests and in the 

 beds of rivers. Among the native Maoris there are many traditional reports 

 about these birds, vfhich were called mocL Other large birds, such as the 

 palapteryx and the aptornis, are also spoken of by them. It is now about 

 twenty-five years since a fragment of a bone, about a foot long, and very 

 nearly as much in its smallest circumference, was forwarded to Professor Owen 

 for examination. It had been found in New Zealand,' where the natives 

 ascribed it to a gigantic bird called moa, which they knew only by tradition , 

 but which they believed might still exist in the more secluded districts of the 

 country. The bone-fragment was part of the shaft of a femur ; it was one- 

 third as great in diameter as the femur of the largest kind of emu, and it 

 had evidently belonged to a very large and powerful bird. Professor Owen 

 came to the conclusion that it was a relic of a heavier and more sluggish 

 animal, with shorter and thicker legs, than the emu or ostrich, and that it 

 probably presented proportions more nearly resembling those of the dodo than 

 of any existing StmthionidcE. Subsequent discoveries have confirmed, in 

 the main, the correctness of these acute conjectures. Some of the remains 

 since brought over to this country are now deposited in the British Museum^f 

 and the College of Surgeons possesses an almost perfectly restored skeleton. 

 These remains prove that the moa, or dinornis, as Professor Owen has styled 

 it, is a wingless bird, somewhat like the apteryx, but very much larger than 

 it or any other living bird. There are eight or nine different varieties, ranging 

 in height from four to ten and a half feet. " The extraordinary number of 

 wingless birds," says Professor Owen, and the vast stature of some of the 

 species peculiar to ISTew Zealand, and which have finally become extinct in 

 that small tract of dry land, suggest it to be a remnant of a larger tract or 

 continent over Avhich this singular struthious fauna formerly ranged. One 

 might almost be disposed to regard JSTew Zealand as one end of the mighty 



