155

133

defined under the name of Din. casuarinus ; but the most extraordinary species is that
which I propose to call Dinornis crassus. It is intermediate in size between Din. ingens
and Din. struthoides : with a stature nearly equal in height to that of the Ostrich, the
femur and tarso-metatarsus (P. XL. figg. 4 & 5) present double the thickness in
proportion to their length : it must have been the strongest and most robust of Birds,
and may be said to have represented the pachydermal type and proportions in the
feathered class.

The species described under the name of Din. casuarinus combined the stature of the
Cassowary with more robust proportions, and especially more gallinaceous character of
the feet. The third new species is intermediate in size between the Din. didiformis and
Din. otidiformis, and I propose to name it Dinornis curtus. Although the majority of
the remains of Din. casuarinus have come from the Middle Island, a few specimens
have reached me from the North Island. Remains of Dinornis crassus have hitherto
been found only in the Middle Island, and those of Dinornis curtus are at present as
exclusively from the North Island.

Of the Dinornis curtus I have received from Mr. Cotton the shaft of a femur, a little
more complete than that of the Dinornis otidiformis, and apparently shorter in pro-
portion to its circumference, but having the same relative superiority of general size,
and especially thickness, which is manifested in the tibia and tarso-metatarse of the
Din. curtus.

The tibia of Dinornis curtus (Pl. XXXIX. figg. 3, 4 & 5) resembles that of Dinornis
casuarinus in the extent and form of the ectocnemial process (k) ; in the distance between
this and the procnemial crista (p), and in the position and course of the ridge continued
thence down the fore-part of the shaft to the inner pier of the distal osseous bridge (f).
It differs from Din. casuarinus and the other larger species of the genus in the lower
position of the nutri-arterial foramen, which is nearly half-way between the two ends of
the bone. The distal condyles resemble those of the tibiae of the larger species much
more than those of the smaller Din. otidiformis. The inner side of the shaft is more
rounded, less angular than in Dinornis didiformis or Din. casuarinus, and the anterior
surface slopes more abruptly backwards to the fibular ridge ; the surface between the
anterior ridge and fibular ridge being convex in Din. curtus, but almost plane in Din.
casuarinus. The outer (fibular) division (o) of the distal condyle is less produced for-
wards than in din. didformis, but in this respect resembles that in Din. casuarinus ; its
transverse extent is however relatively greater. The tibia, and consequently the whole
leg of Din. curtus, is shorter in proportion to the femur and the tarso-metatarsus than
in the Din. didiformis or any other species, except probably the Din. crassus, of which
only the femur and tarso-metatarsus have yet been obtained.

That Dinornis curtus is not the young of Din. didiformis, is proved by its tarso-
metatarsal bone (Pl. XL.fig. 6). The tarso-metatarsal bone m 2, p. 79, (Pl. XXVII.
fig. 3,) proves that the homologous bone of a young Din. didformis, of the size of that

s 2