er in length), but not what we should have expected from a bird
from twelve to fourteen feet in height. And this the rather when we
consider that the egg of the New Zealand _Apteryx_, to which these birds
manifest a very close affinity, is one of dimensions that are quite
surprising in proportion to the bulk of the bird. The Apteryx is about
as big as a turkey, standing two feet in height, but its egg measures
four inches ten lines by three inches two lines in the respective
diameters. The egg of the _Dinornis giganteus_, to bear the same ratio
to the bird as this, would be of the incredible length of two feet and a
half, by a breadth of one and three quarters! Possibly this specimen,
though indubitably the egg of one of this great family of extinct birds,
may after all be that of one of the subordinate species.

But about the same time as Mr Mantell's discovery, one of equal interest
was made in Madagascar. The master of a French ship obtained, in 1850,
from natives of the island, three eggs, of far greater size, and
fragments of the leg-bones of an immense bird. These, on their arrival
at Paris, formed the subjects of valuable investigations by M. Isidore
Geoffroy St Hilaire[16] and Professor Owen.[17]

The native statement was, that one of the eggs had been found entire in
the bed of a torrent, among the debris of a land-slip; that a second
egg, with some fragments of bone, was subsequently found in a formation
_which is stated to be alluvial_; a third egg, which the natives had
perforated at one end, and used as a vessel, was also found. This last
egg was broken in the carriage, the other two arrived in Europe entire.

These two, though nearly alike in size, differed considerably in their
relative proportions and shape, the one being shorter and thicker, with
more equal ends than the other. The following table shews the dimensions
of both compared with those of an ostrich's egg:--

Ovoid egg. Ellipsoid egg. Ostrich egg.
ft. in. li. ft. in. li. ft. in. li.
Longer circumference 2 10 9 2 9 6 1 6 0
Shorter circumference 2 4 3 2 5 6 1 4 6
Extreme length 1 0 8 1 0 5 0 6 4

M. Geoffroy St Hilaire estimates the larger of the two to contain 10-1/8
quarts, or the contents of nearly six eggs of the Ostrich, or sixteen of
the Cassowary, or a hundred and forty-eight of