HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



G3 



Doats, and in the fish-baskets. These eggs were, 

 on an average, half an inch in diameter ; and on 

 looking into the mouths of several of the males of 

 both genera, from fifteen to twenty eggs were seen 

 in each ; those in the boats and baskets having evi- 

 dently dropped out from a similar situation. The 

 eggs were in different stages of development, some 

 advanced so far as to be just hatched. They filled 

 the mouth, extending as far back as the branchise. 

 No food was found in the alimentary canal, though 

 in the females it was full of nutriment. 



Neav Classification of Birds. — At a recent 

 meeting of the Zoological Society, Mr. A. H. Garrod 

 reada paper in which he proposed a new classification 

 of birds, founded mainly on the disposition of their 

 muscles and other soft parts. The five muscles 

 which he had observed to vary most were the 

 ambiens, the femoro-eaudal, the accessory femoro- 

 caudal, the semi-tendinosus and the accessory semi- 

 tendinosus. lifter stating which of these are pre- 

 sent or absent in the different families of birds, he 

 showed that the presence or absence of the ambiens 

 muscle is so ultimately correlated with other cha- 

 racters, that a division of the whole class into IIo- 

 maloijoiiaii aud Anomnlogonuti, depending on that 

 peculiarity, would stand the test of much criticism. 

 The Homalogonatous birds were divided into the 

 Galliformes, the Auseriformes, the Ciconiiformes 

 and tiie Charadriiformes ; the Auomalogonatous 

 into the Passeriformes, the Piciformes, and the 

 Cypseliformes. Among the most important changes 

 proposed or substantiated were the placing Serpen- 

 tarius and Cariama with the Otididaj, the Cypselidae 

 with the Trochilidse, aud the Musophagidse among 

 the Galliformes. 



The Basking Shark. — An interesting ichthyo- 

 logical discovery has lately been made by Professor 

 Steenstrup, of Copenhagen. He finds that certain 

 comblike bodies, which have been supposed to be 

 appendages of the skin of certain sharks, are really 

 sifting organs appended to the interior of the gill- 

 apertures of the Basking Shark ; and he infers that 

 this fish, the largest shark of the northern regions, 

 which attains a length of thirty-five feet or more, 

 lives, like the still more gigantic whales, upon the 

 bodies of small marine animals strained from the 

 water by these peculiar fringes. The very fine rays 

 composing the fringes are five or six inches long 

 and were some years ago shown by Professor Han- 

 nover to consist of dentine, so that each of them 

 may be regarded as, to a certain extent, the analogue 

 of a tooth. It is remarkable that Bishop Gunnerus, 

 who originally described the Basking Shark {Selachus 

 maximus), and regarded it as the fish that swallowed 

 the prophet Jonah, had noticed the existence of 

 these branchial sieves more than a century ago ; 

 but although some subsequent writers (such as Low, 

 Pennant, Mitchell, aud Foulis) have mentioned 



them, no one, except perhaps Gunnerus himself, 

 seems to have recognized their importance in the 

 economy of the fish. The late Sir Andrew Smith, 

 however, describes the occurrence of a similar 

 structure in \\\s, Rhinodon tuplcus ("the largest of 

 living animals," according to Dr. Percival Wright, 

 "the north whale excepted"), a near ally of our 

 Basking Shark, which inhabits the Indian Ocean. 

 Low states that the stomach of a specimen examined 

 by him " was full of a red stuff, like bruised crabs^ 

 or the roe of the sea-urchin," but he could find no 

 fragments of fish in it. It is very curious to find 

 these monsters of the deep depending for their sub- 

 sistence on creatures whose minuteness presents 

 such an absolute contrast to their own gigantic 

 bulk. 



Disappearance of Colias Edtjsa.— Though I 

 have been frequently about this autumn (1S73) in a 

 district of North Kent, where this butterfly is a well- 

 known frequenter of the clover-fields, I have not 

 seen a single individual. Irregularity in the ap- 

 pearance of the species is no new phenomenon, open 

 as it is to various explanations. Having seen 

 Edusa on the wing for several successive seasons, I 

 have doubts as to the feasibility of the notion of a 

 periodical disappearance. There is one circumstance 

 that occurs to me tuat I have not as yet seen pointed 

 out, viz., that as the larva feeds in clover-fields, the 

 customary plan of the rotation of crops is highly 

 against its increase. Thus, between Gravesend and 

 Cobham are some extentiive fields, a few years since 

 covered with clover, where Edusa abounded ; these 

 are now cropped with cereals or potatoes, and the 

 change was made just at the season when the larvae, 

 if hatched in the autumn, would be in a state of 

 hybernation, and therefore, in such an event, likely 

 to be destroyed. No doubt, occasionally at least^ 

 the species follows the habit of /. rhamni, aud the 

 eggs are not laid till the spring ; but I am not in- 

 clined to the beUef that tliis is the invariable 

 practice,'as some entomologists suppose. Were it 

 so, we should more frequently meet with C. Edusa 

 in the spring months ; whereas, in fact, it is hardly 

 ever seen then. There can hardly be any difference 

 of opinion regarding the change the English climate 

 has undergone during the last thirty or forty years, 

 it having become, on the whole, decidedly milder ; 

 and it is an interesting subject of inquiry, in con- 

 nection with the economy of our Lepidoptera, and 

 indeed of insects generally, how far this alteration 

 has affected, and will alfcct, their periodical times 

 of passing through their transformations. — J.B. S. C. 



LoNGEYiTY OF BiRDS.— At a reccnt meeting of 

 the Dublin Zoological Society it was announced 

 that a pelican, which had been living in the gardens 

 of the Society for forty-two years, had just died. 

 He was believed to have been eight years old when 

 he was brought to Dublin. How thoroughly he had 



