170

146

The ulna (Pl. CVI. fig. 3) is distinguished from that of the largest Eagles more by
its thickness and the expansion of its articular ends than by its superiority in length.
The proximal surfaces for both condyles of the humerus bear proportion to their
characteristic development in that bone ; the 'coronoid' angle (d) is well marked.
The distal articular convexity (k) indicates the extent of the evolutions of the manual
part of the wing, with its great 'primary remiges,' in the actions of flight. My photo-
graphs showed no indication of the pits and prominences for the 'secondary' and
'tertiary' remiges ; and Von Haast expressly states that in the ulna first obtained from
the Glenmark alluvium "the quill-knobs are obliterated :" but this may be due to
posthumous decay or abrasion ; for in the second and smaller examples of ulna obtained
from the left bank of the Glenmark creek, 'two rows of quill-knobs, and principally
the one on the ulnar side, are well seen, as well as the intermuscular ridge on the
palmar side and the flat processes for the attachments of muscles "1.

One metacarpus only, the left, of Harpagornis seems hitherto to have been found ; it
was associated with the series belonging to a smaller individual, and indicative either
of a sexual (male) or a smaller variety, or of a smaller but nearly allied species of
Harpagornis. Von Haast remarks, however, of this compound wing-bone, that 'it is
not only a little longer than that of Aquila" (audax ?), 'but also much stouter in its
proportions. This is most conspicuous in the medius metacarpal and the proximal
end. The process for the attachment of the index phalanx is broad and heart-shaped ;
and the two principal intermuscular ridges upon the medius metacarpal enclose a broad
and well-defined channel"2.

Femur. - With the usual characteristics of this bone in the Raptorial order, the
femur of Harpagornis is remarkable for its greater relative thickness and the greater
expanse of its extremities, especially of the distal one. The pneumatic foramen
(Pl. CVIII. fig. 2, g) is large, single and situated, as usual in the Order, on the fore
part of the bone between the praetrochanterian ridge (ib. ib. f, k)) and the supporting
base (d) of the head (a) of the femur ; no constriction, like a 'neck,' is present ; and
the head, from which the articular cartilage was extended along the upper surface of
the supporting base to the great trochanter, is as characteristically sessile as in other
Raptores. The contrast which the present New-Zealand fossil presents with the femora
of the great extinct wingless birds of the island, in the configuration of the proximal
end of the femur, may be appreciated by comparing the figures of the femur of Harpa-
gornis moorei in Pl. CVI. with those of the femur of Dinornis gravis (Pls. XLI. &
XLI. A). The ectotrochanterian ridge (k) is less convex in contour than in the Golden
Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) ; the hypotrochanterian roughness for the insertion of the
intrapelvic muscle, which I have called 'obturator internus' in the Apteryx (ante,
p.56), has more the form of a ridge in Harpagornis than of a tubercle.

1. Trans. and Proc. of the New-Zealand Institute, vol. vi.p. 70.
2. Tom. cit. p. 71.