"First among them were the gigantic wingless Moas, <i>Dinornis</i> and <i>Palapteryx</i>, which seem to have been exterminated already about the middle of the seventeenth century."
[Query, eighteenth century?]
1867. Ibid. p. 181:
"By the term `Moa' the natives signify a family of birds, that we know merely from bones and skeletons, a family of real giant-birds compared with the little Apterygides."
[Footnote]: "Moa or Toa, throughout Polynesia, is the word applied to domestic fowls, originating perhaps from the Malay word mua, a kind of peasants [sic]. The Maoris have no special term for the domestic fowl."
1888. W. L. Buller, `Birds of New Zealand,' Introduction, p. lvi. [Footnote]:
"I have remarked the following similarity between the names employed in the Fijian and Maori languages for the same or corresponding birds: Toa (any fowl-like kind of bird) = Moa (<i>Dinornis</i>)."
<hw>Mob</hw>, <i>n</i>. a large number, the Australian noun of multitude, and not implying anything low or noisy. It was <i>not</i> used very early, as the first few of the following quotations show.
1811. G. Paterson, `History of New South Wales,' p. 530:
"Besides herds of kangaroos, four large wolves were seen at Western Port."