s that of worrying, wearying, and frightening its four-footed prey
until it drops; sometimes the condor drives its victim over a precipice.

Bianconi concludes that on the same scale of proportion as the condor's,
the great quills of the Aepyornis would be about 10 feet long, and the
spread of the wings about 32 feet, whilst the height of the bird would be
at least four times that of the condor. These are indeed little more than
conjectures. And I must add that in Professor Owen's opinion there is no
reasonable doubt that the Aepyornis was a bird allied to the Ostriches.

We gave, in the first edition of this work, a drawing of the great
Aepyornis egg in the British Museum of its true size, as the nearest
approach we could make to an illustration of the _Rukh_ from nature. The
actual contents of this egg will be about 2.35 gallons, which may be
compared with Fra Mauro's _anfora_! Except in this matter of size, his
story of the ship and the egg may be true.

A passage from Temple's Travels in Peru has been quoted as exhibiting
exaggeration in the description of the condor surpassing anything that can
be laid to Polo's charge here; but that is, in fact, only somewhat heavy
banter directed against our traveller's own narrative. (See _Travels in
Various Parts of Peru_, 1830, II. 414-417.)

Recently fossil bones have been found in New Zealand, which seem to bring
us a step nearer to the realization of the Rukh. Dr. Haast discovered in a
swamp at Glenmark in the province of Otago, along with remains of the
_Dinornis_ or Moa, some bones (femur, ungual phalanges, and rib) of a
gigantic bird which he pronounces to be a bird of prey, apparently allied
to the Harriers, and calls _Harpagornis_. He supposes it to have preyed
upon the Moa, and as that fowl is calculated to have been 10 feet and
upwards in height, we are not so very far from the elephant-devouring
Rukh. (See _Comptes Rendus, Ac. des Sciences_ 1872, p. 1782; and _Ibis_,
October 1872, p. 433.) This discovery may possibly throw a new light on
the traditions of the New Zealanders. For Professor Owen, in first
describing the _Dinornis_ in 1839, mentioned that the natives had a
tradition that the bones belonged _to a bird of the eagle kind_. (See
_Eng. Cyc._ Nat. Hist. sub. v. _Dinornis_.) And Sir Geo. Grey appears to
have read a paper, 23rd October 1872,[4] which was the description by a
Maori of the _Hokiol_, an extinct gigantic bird of prey of which that
people have tr