vegetation consists of small and inconspicuous plants, with occasional patches of manuka. In some places a space of ground of nearly an acre is completely bare, and by the-sections exposed is seen to be solid vegetable peat, which in many places is certainly of a depth of 10ft., and probably even 20ft. The cause of these bare patches, devoid of any surface vegetation, may be either that, the water of a pond or lagoon has been drained away, or that fire has burned a certain part away in the dry seasons; but, whatever the cause, on these barren areas are seen heaps of unmistakable gizzard-stones of pure-white quartz. In the majority of cases it is not possible to isolate absolutely the total contents of one gizzard, but we were fortunate enough to find at least two examples which would convince even the most sceptical as to the real character of the heaps more or less scattered on the ground.

The first of these was just being exposed by the action of the weather from underneath a clump of manuka, and only a few of the larger stones were visible. On digging into the peat we noticed that, although the interstices between the stones were filled up with closely-interlaced vegetable fibres, similar in substance to the rest of the peaty soil, yet it was of a decidedly yellow colour, in contrast to the brown of the peat. The stones were found to be closely compacted together in a ball-shaped mass, and were of all sizes, from those less than a pea to those larger than a pigeon's egg. We carefully cut out this mass, which was as large as a man's head, and could find no stones in the peat immediately surrounding the collection. The stones were carefully washed out and dried, and tied up in a separate bundle, and on weighing them afterwards they were found to turn the scale at 4j1b.

The second example was on lower ground close to a large lagoon, and only a few small stones were visible. Packed in between the stones was the same comminuted vegetable matter of a much lighter colour than the surrounding peat. This mass we removed as carefully as possible and tied it up separately. I have picked out most of the stones, and dried and examined the vegetable matter in which the stones are imbedded and interwoven, and I find it to consist of vast numbers of seeds of Leucopogon and Coprosmas (?), and short twigs and branches which cannot be well identified. Some of the material I have forwarded to Mr. T. Kirk for examination and identification.

The number of stones in these two gizzards must far-exceed those described by Mr. Chapman in his paper. In the second example the weight of the stones was just six pounds.

Still continuing our walk over the bleak and barren moorland, we saw unnumbered scattered heaps of these whitequartz

pebbles, and in one place more than a barrowload of them. This heap must have weighed over a hundredweight at least, and could only have resulted from the destruction of numbers of birds crossing some unusually soft or treacherous part of the swamp during a long series of years; or they may have been gathered together by flowing water, and deposited in a hole at the bottom of some channel or pool on the surface of the peat, and subsequently exposed by changes of level and subaerial action.

Near this great heap two curious observations were made: one was, on cutting into the peat for a few inches We came to a “pocket” of clean sharp quartz-sand-about a pint, just like sea-shore sand-with a few small pebbles in it. This could not possibly have been deposited where we found it by any natural physical agency. Mr. Chapman, I believe, met with a similar small pocket of sand on the top of Maungatua, on the south side of the Taieri Plain, at the height of about 3,000ft.

The other find was the proximal end of a metatarsal bone of a moa of medium size (possibly D.crassus), almost entirely decalcified. This was the only fragment of bone which the most rigorous search could find, and Mr. Chapman informed me that on a previous occasion he had found a similar fragment in the same condition. Now, I had always supposed peat-swamps to be the happy hunting-grounds for the bone-hunter, and was much disappointed at not finding any trace of the birds which used all these gizzard-stones, and I constructed several ingenious theories to account for the matter, some of which fitted the facts delightfully; but on testing the samples of peat which I took home I found that ordinary litmus-paper was immediately reddened when placed in contact with the peat.

Here, then, was the explanation of the mystery-the strongly acid character of the decaying vegetable matter dissolved the bones entirely; and, instead of the peat-deposit of Swampy Hill turning out either a Glenmark, Hamilton, or Enfield, only the imperishable quartz pebbles contained in the gizzard have remained to testify to the former abundance of Dinornithidae in that part.

On looking up the subject of peat, I find that Sir Charles Lyell ^* says, “The antlers of large and full-grown stags are among the most common and conspicuous remains of animals in peat. They are not horns which have been shed, for portions of the skull are found attached, proving that the whole animal perished. But as a general rule no remains are met with belonging to extinct quadrupeds, such as the elephant,