208 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1896. 



A paper under the following title was presented for publication : — 



" Dr. Collett on the morphology of the cranium and the auricular 

 openings in the north European species of the Family Strigidie; 

 to which is added some recent opinions upon the systematic position 

 of the Owls," by R. W. Shufeldt, M. D. 



On the recommendation of the Council an invitation to the 

 Academy from the University of Glasgow to participate in the 

 celebration of the fiftieth year of the Right Honorable Lord 

 Kelvin's tenure of office of the Chair of Natural Philosophy therein 

 was accepted and General Isaac Jones Wistar was appointed 

 to represent the Academy on the occasion. 



On a Collection of Barnacles. — Mr. H. A. Pilsbry spoke of a collec- 

 tion of barnacles from the bottom of the iron ship " Puritan " of Glas- 

 gow, which had been dry docked in Cramp's shipyard after a voyage 

 from San Francisco to Hong Kong, and to Philadelphia via Java and 

 India. The forms represented were Balanus tintinnahulum L., B. 

 tintinnahuluin zebra Darwin, B. tintinnahulum spinosus Gm., Tetra- 

 ciitaporosa jyatellaris Darwin, Lepas anatifera L. and L. Hillii Leach. 

 The forms ranked as varieties of B. tintinnahuluin retain their in- 

 dividuality perfectly, although growing side by side under appar- 

 ently identical external conditions, so that their differential charac- 

 teristics can scarcely be attributed to unlike environmental factors. 

 The variety of Tetraclita porosa seems to be a rare form, originally 

 described by Darwin from three examples taken off a ship's bottom 

 in Boston by Dr. A. A. Gould. It is very unlike the ordinary form 

 of the species. Specimens of Ostrcea rivularis Gld. are attached to some 

 of the barnacles. As this is a species of east Asian seas, it is very 

 probable that the load of barnacles was obtained in China ; although 

 the Balanidie themselves have been so widely diffused by commerce 

 tliat alone they afford but little evidence of their originnhpatria. 

 The sjDecimens were procured and presented to the Academy by 

 Master Lester Bernstein. 



Pugnus jyarvus. — Mr. Pilsbry also spoke of a remarkable shell 

 representing a new genus of Tectibranchiate mollusks, Pugnus par- 

 vus Hedley, of which a specimen from Middle Harbor, near Sydney, 

 N. S. W., Australia, was exhibited. The shell is involute, like that 

 oi Bulla, Haminea, Ci/lichna and many other genera of Cephalas- 

 pidea ; but it differs from all of these in the remarkable features of 

 a thickened outer lip and thrice-folded columella. These characters 

 caused Mr. Hedley, its describer, to consider Pugnus a " telescoped " 

 Ringicula. All other Ringiculidre, both fossil and recent, have the 

 spire developed ; so that Pugnus stands unique in that family in its 

 depressed and concealed spire. The generic name is an allusion to 

 the resemblance of the shell to a clenched hand. 



