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HARDWICKE'S SC I E NCE-G O SSiP. 



the earlier stages of its development. The sponge 

 forms the type of a new genus, and Professor 

 Thomson proposes to call it Poliopogon amadou. 

 A dredging 500 miles south-west of Teneriffe, with 

 3,400 fathoms of line, brought up yellowish ooze, in 

 which were found several small living moUusca, 

 belonging to the genera Area, Limopsis, and Leda, 

 as well as two new bi-yozoans. Eoraminifei'a were 

 abundant, as well as some beautiful radiolarians. 

 The Professor mentions another dredging, in which 

 he was greatly interested, when 3,600 fathoms of 

 rope were paid out. The dredge was out eight hours, 

 and brought up about one cwt. of red clay. This 

 was the deepest, by several hundred fathoms, that 

 had yet been made. It was singularly poor in 

 organisms, and from its absence of foraminifera, only 

 three or four being found of the cristellarian series, 

 the Professor attributes this peculiar red deposit 

 to the movement of water from some special locality, 

 very possibly the mouths of the great South 

 American rivers, 



Provincial Natural History Societies. — 

 The programme of the Leeds Naturalists' Pield 

 Club for the quarter April to June, shows that 

 alternately with "exhibition of specimens and 

 conversation," which takes place once a fortnight, 

 papers on subjects on scientific interest are to be 

 read. Excursions also take place on an average 

 once a fortniglit, the first object of the Club being 

 "the minute investigation of the natural history, 

 in all its branches, of the immediate neighbourhood 

 of Leeds, and a more general investigation of the 

 whole of the West Riding." This Society was 

 founded in 1870, and was reorganized on a broader 

 basis in March, 1872, and seems to be doing good 

 work. 



BOTANY. 



Variation or Size among Certain Trees. — 

 At a recent meeting of the Philadelphia Academy of 

 Natural Sciences, Mr. Thomas Meehan dwelt upon 

 the remarkable manner with which certain dwarf 

 trees assumed arboreal proportions when removed 

 to other habitats. For instsnce, Qiiercus prinoides 

 seldom grew more than two feet in height. It was 

 one of the smallest of shrubs. In bis collections in 

 Kansas, he found oaks in the vicinity of Leaven- 

 worth, which made small trees from ten to fifteen 

 feet high, and with stems from one to two feet in 

 circumference. lie was entirely satisfied that it is 

 identical in every respect but size with the Q. 

 prinoides of the Eastern States. Among trees 

 there are few which produce forms as low shrubs ; 

 but the Finns Baulcsiana, in the East but a bush 

 of five or ten feet, grew often forty feet along the 

 shores of Lake Superior; the Castanea pumila, 

 Chinquapin chestnut, when it gets out of the sands 



of New Jersey into the clayey soils west of the 

 Delaware, often grew as large as many full-grown 

 apple-trees; while the CeJfii occidentalis, which in 

 the East is generally but a straggling bush along 

 fence corners, is in Ohio a large spreading tree with 

 enormous trunk, and in Indiana is as lofty and as , 

 graceful as an elm. 



Are Oak-galls Ealse Acorns ?— Mr. Newman, 

 in a recent paper upon galls, in the Entomologist, 

 propounds the theory that these singular objects 

 come as near to the true acorn as the tree can 

 make them, the oak being unwilling to be diverted 

 from its legitimate aim of producing good fruit. 

 Two opposing forces meet'; the gall-insect, in its 

 endeavour to develop suitable nutriment for its 

 kind, is more or less thwarted by the natural efforts 

 of the tree. According to the amount of efiicacy 

 with which these are put forth, so is the result. 

 Hence we meet with galls sometimes so fantastic 

 and irregular in outline that they seem in no wise 

 akin to the true acorn ; in other instances we have 

 galls,like that conjectured to be produced by Cyiiips 

 Kolleri, where the exterior is scarcely to be dis- 

 tinguished from the true acorn, and each is sur" 

 mounted by a style. The very common "artichoke 

 gall " is a small representation of an acorn, seated 

 amongst the scales of the involucre. — /. U. S. C. 



Stapelia EuROPiEA. — TlicStapclias are generally 

 considered as belonging solely to the southern 

 hemisphere, natives of the Cape of Good Hope; 

 one species, however, has been discovered at Oran, 

 in Algeria, by Mr. Munbj% a botanist, who was 

 resident there for many years, and who gave it the 

 name of Boucerosia Munbiana. I found it in the 

 crevices of the high rocks at Santa Cruz, above the 

 town of Oran, tolerably abundant, but not in flower, 

 in the month of Pebruary. It is suid by Mr. 

 Muuby, in his Catalogue of the Flora of Algeria, to 

 be identical with the Stapelia Europcea, which is 

 stated in Lindley's "Vegetable Kingdom" to be 

 found in Sicily, and in the Tourist's Flora of Woods 

 as at "Lopadusa, with stems short, square, smooth; 

 flowers fasciculate, filaments quite simple, with two 

 glands, ss. 7, 11." Through some mistake, as Mr, 

 Munby informed me, it was incorrectly figured in a 

 French publication of the flora of Algeria, but that 

 a perfectly correct figure is given in his catalogue. 

 I gave several live plants to Mons. De Notaris, of 

 Genoa, Mons. Moris, of Turin, and one to the late 

 Sir Wm. Hooker, all of wiiom were glad to accept 

 them, as the only species found in the northern 

 hemisphere and but recently discovered. I have 

 not by me at present the Flora of Sicily of Gussone, 

 but suppose he has described it ; the flower is very 

 insignificant, bearing in appearance no resemblance 

 to those of the Cape.— T. B. W. 



Asphodels. — On a rocky plain a little above the 

 locality of ;the Stapelia, is found i\\Q A.tphodellus 



