XXX 
INTRODUCTION. 
feathers belonged to a different species of Moa to that in the York Museum ; but as none of the bones 
were obtained it was impossible to say to which of those enumerated above. Hutton’s drawing of the 
feather (as given at p. 442 of the ‘Memoirs’) does not accord very well with his description. The 
figure given on plate cxiv. (1. c. vol. ii.) from the same correspondent seems to be more accurate. 
At a somewhat later date other Moa-feathers, in an equally fresh condition, were found in a 
locality between Alexandra and Roxburgh ; and these, according to Hutton, are distinguished by the 
presence of barbules to the tips, from which it may be inferred that they belonged to a less typical 
Struthious form. 
In 1871 Dr. (now Sir James) Hector described a remarkable specimen from the same district, 
being the neck of a Moa, apparently of the largest size, upon the posterior aspect of which the skin, 
partly covered with denuded feathers, was still attached by the shrivelled muscles and ligaments *. 
This unique specimen was found by a gold-miner in a cave, or under an overhanging mass of mica- 
schist, and is now in the Colonial Museum at Wellington. 
In 1874 Professor Hutton described the right foot of Dinornis ingens “ with the whole of the 
skin and muscles of the posterior side well preserved.” It was found by Mr. Allen in a deep crevice 
among mica-schist rocks in the Knobby Ranges, in the provincial district of Otago. Of this specimen 
a figure, one-fourth the natural size, appeared in ‘Nature’ (Feb. 11, 1875). Through some inexplic- 
able mistake the specimen is stated therein to be in the Natural History Museum at Paris; whereas, 
* Sir James Hector, writing on this subject, says : — “The above interesting discoveries render it probable that the inland 
district of Otago, at a time when its grassy plains and rolling hills were covered with a dense scrubby vegetation or a light forest 
growth, was where the giant wingless birds of Hew Zealand lingered to latest times. It is impossible to convey an idea of the 
profusion of bones which, only a few years ago, were found in this district, scattered on the surface of the ground, or buried in 
the alluvial soil in the neighbourhood of streams and rivers. At the present time this area of country is particularly arid as 
compared with the prevalent character of Hew Zealand. It is perfectly treeless — nothing but the smallest sized shrubs being 
found within a distance of sixty or seventy miles. The surface-features comprise round-backed ranges of hills of schistose rock 
with swamps on the top, deeply cut by ravines that open out on basin-shaped plains formed of alluvial deposits that have been 
everywhere moulded into beautifully regular terraces, to an altitude of 1700 feet above the sea-level. That the mountain-slopes 
were at one time covered with forest, the stumps and prostrate trunks of large trees, and the mounds and pits on the surface of 
the ground which mark old forest land, abundantly testify, although it is probable that the intervening plains have never 
supported more than a dense thicket of shrubs, or were partly occupied by swamps. The greatest number of Hoa-bones were 
found where rivers debouch on the plains, and that at a comparatively late period these plains were the hunting-grounds of the 
aborigines, can be proved almost incontestably Still clearer evidence that in very recent times the natives travelled 
through the interior, probably following the Moa as a means of subsistence, like natives in the countries where large game 
abounds, was obtained in 1865-6 by Messrs. J. and W. Munson. At the Maniatoto plains bones of several species of Dinornis, 
Aptornis, Apteryx, large Rails, Stringops, and other birds are exceedingly abundant in the alluvium of a particular stream, so 
much so that they are turned up by the plough with facility A desire to account for the great profusion of Moa-bones 
on a lower terrace shelf nearer the margin of the stream, led the Messrs. Murison to explore the ground carefully, and by 
excavating in likely spots they found a series of circular pits partly lined with stones, and containing, intermixed with charcoal, 
abundance of Moa-bones and egg-shells, together with bones of the dog, the egg-shells being in such quantities that they consider 
that hundreds of eggs must have been cooked in each hole. Along with these were stone implements of various kinds, and of 
several other varieties of rock, besides the chert which lies on the surface. The form and contents of theso coolcing-ovens 
correspond exactly with those described by Mantell in 1847, as occurring on the sea-coast ; and among the stone implements 
which Mantell found in them, he remembers some to have been of the same chert which occurs in situ at this locality, fifty miles 
in the interior. The greater number of these chert specimens found on the coast are with the rest of the collection in the 
British Museum The above facts and arguments in support of the view that the Moa survived to very recent times are 
similar to those advanced, at a very early period after the settlement of the colony, by Walter Mantell, who had the advantage 
of direct information on the subject from a generation of natives that has passed away. As the first explorer of the artificial 
Moa-beds, his opinion is entitled to great weight. Similar conclusions were also drawn by Buller, who is personally familiar 
with the facts described in the North Island, in an article that appeared in the ‘ Zoologist’ for 1864,” 
