272 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



tacks of the sharks, rays, and other fish of powerful jaws, and 

 induce them to subject the bunch of matter to such a masti- 

 cation as should produce serious harm to the cable. To what 

 extent any accidents have happened from this source it is 

 perhaps difficult to say ; but we now learn that the Florida 

 cable, between Punta Rosa and Key West, has been injured in 

 numerous places, as supposed by sea turtles biting through or 

 crushing it in their teeth, to such an extent as to destroy its 

 continuity. It is, perhaps, a question whether the turtle be 

 chargeable with these operations ; and we think it is quite as 

 probable that, under the circumstances, some ray or other 

 fish has attacked it, and for the reasons already suggested. 

 8 A, August, 1811, 149. 



INJURY TO THE CHINA SUBMARINE CABLE. 



Attention has been called to injuries to the Florida subma- 

 rine cable, supposed to have been caused either by the bites 

 of the sea turtles or from some kinds of fish ; and we now 

 learn that in China a similar difficulty has been experienced 

 in consequence of the attacks of a minute crustacean. This 

 is so small as scarcely to be appreciable to the naked eye, but 

 can be readily defined under the microscope. Various breaks 

 have been satisfactorily referred to the agency of these ani- 

 mals, which had imbedded themselves in the gutta-percha. 

 It has become necessary, therefore, to envelop the cables in 

 certain localities with an external supplementary layer of 

 metallic wire, in order to prevent injury in this manner. 1 

 B, October 15, 1871,21. 



darwin's collections in natural history. 



According to the Athenaeum, Mr. Darwin has presented to 

 the University of Cambridge a remainder of the collections 

 in invertebrate zoology made by him during the celebrated 

 voyage of the Beagle. These will form a desirable addition 

 to the treasures which the museum of the university is rapid- 

 ly accumulating under the superintendence of Professor Al- 

 fred Newton. The museum has for some time been in the 

 possession of the collections of Mr. William Swainson, em- 

 bracing a large number of types of his descriptions of new 

 species of birds. The extensive collection of birds and eggs 

 of Western North America of the late James Hepburn, a gen- 



