TiiE UlOLOU i' Oi' KJELSOIn. 
filled with, tertiary strata, which at some places attain an 
altitude of 2000 feet. 
This formation is divided into two parts: the lower, or a 
brown-coal formation ; the upper, fossiliferous marl, sandstone, 
and limestone. 
I will give a short description of these strata, from Cape 
Farewell to Awatere. 
It is a remarkable fact that at Cape I arewell, the north- 
westernmost point ol the Middle Island, where the sea swanns 
with echinides, commonly called sea-eggs, the tertiary sandstone 
cliffs are also found full of fossil remains of the same family, 
but differing in species. 
In the Aorere valley the original tertiary strata are, by later 
action, for the most part destroyed. On the western side of 
the valley indications of brown-coal have been found. On the 
cliffs of Collingwood, marls, containing tew tossils, are the 
representatives ot the formation. 
Higher up the valley large isolated masses of a fossiliferous 
calcareous sandstone, or, if you will, ot a sandy limestone, 
penetrated by numerous caves, are the remains oi a once 
continuous tertiary stratum. 
The caves above Washbo urn’s Flat, in these isolated lime¬ 
stone blocks, have lately become famed as bone caves, the 
cemeteries of gigantic birds, which, in the traditions ot the 
Maoris, are remembered as the frightful Moas, and which to 
science are known as the genera of Dinornis , Notornis , and 
Palaptenx . 
When, in 1857, I saw in the British Museum the skeletons 
of Dinornis elephantopus and Dinornis robustus , I little thought 
that I should so soon be in possession of the same treasures. 
Before my arrival at Collingwood I had heard ot the late 
discovery of Moa bones in those caves, and I was anxious to 
procure those specimens, which I had had so little success in 
obtaining in the Northern Island. 
In the first cave which I entered—my friend Haast has 
since given it my name—after a short search, I dug out frag¬ 
ments of bones from the loam on the bottom ot the ca\ e. I 
was convinced that the treasures had not all been carried away, 
as from the caves in the Northern Island; and on the same 
day the finding of a Moa skull—so tar as I know the muff 
