466

436

RESTORATION

OF

NOTORNIS.

__________

IN 1847 I detected in a series of bones, chiefly of Dinornis, collected by Walter
Mantell, Esq., in a deposit of volcanic sand, at Waingongoro, North Island of New
Zealand, a mutilated skull indicative of a large bird of the Ralline family, and repre-
senting, as it seemed to me, a generic form previously unknown in that family, for
which the name NOTORNIS was accordingly proposed 1. A sternum in the same col-
lection of bones, which also presented 'ralline' characters, and might, from its size,
have belonged to the same (as then supposed) extinct Coot, led me to define Notornis
as " a struthious or brevipennate form of the Rallidae, intermediate between Porphyrio
and Brachyteryx" 2.

Two years later, viz. in 1849, a party of seamen hunting seals on the shores of
Dusky Bay, in the south-west angle of the South Island of New Zealand, had their
attention attracted by the trail of a bird on the snow, with which the ground happened at
that time to be covered. The foot-prints were larger than those of a kivi or any living
bird of which they had then a knowledge in New Zealand, and they followed the track
until they came in sight of a retreating bird about the size of a turkey. The dogs of the
sealers were cheered on in pursuit, and, after a long chase, the bird was caught in the
gully of a sound behind 'Resolution Island.' When chased it made no attempt to
fly, but ran with great speed, and upon being captured, uttered loud cries and struggled
violently. The bird was rescued from the dogs and kept alive a few days on board
the sealers' schooner, when it was killed, and the body roasted and eaten by the crew.

The skin was fortunately preserved, and was obtained by Mr. W. Mantell, at that
time visiting the south-west part of the South Island. He transmitted the rarity to
his father, Dr. Gideon Mantell, F.R.S., who, in communicating the circumstance to the
Zoological Society of London, wrote : " To the natives of the pahs or villages on the
homeward route, and at Wellington (North Island), the bird was a perfect novelty,

1 Ante, p. 173, and 'Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London,' January 11, 1848, p.1.
2 Ib. p.9. The term Ocydromus had previously (1830) been proposed for the latter ralline genus by
Wagler.