HARD WICKE 'S SCIENCE - G OSS IF. 



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fish. Forbes, in his work on the British starfishes, 

 records it from only two British localities, — the coast 

 of Ayrshire and the Nymph-Bank, off Waterford. 

 The only other notice 1 can find of its capture is by 

 Dr. J. R. Kinahan, F.L.S., who dredged several 

 specimens in Dubhn Bay (i860). The specimen in 

 my possession measures 8J inches across, and is of a 

 brilliant orange colour. It was brought up from a 

 depth of 47 fathoms, associated with living Tere- 

 bratula, Crainia, and other deep-sea mollusca, «S:c. 

 The bottom was rocks or stones, upon which our 

 dredge frequently caught, and which, with the strong 

 current that was running, made dredging operations 

 very difficult. It would be interesting to know if the 

 species has been observed in other localities, and 

 under what conditions. — William S^vnnston, Belfast. 



The Doubleday Collection. — The collection of 

 Lepidoptera formed by the late Henry Doubleday was 

 left in charge of trustees, to be placed in a museum 

 in Essex, if a suitable place could be found. The 

 Haggerstone, East, West, and South London Entomo- 

 logical Societies formed a committee of eight for the 

 purpose of obtaining the collection for London 

 entomologists. After communicating with the trus- 

 tees and the director of the South Kensington 

 Museum, the cabinets were received at the Bethnal 

 Green Branch Museum. The question then arose 

 how it was to be inspected. We petitioned the 

 director again on the subject, and that gentleman 

 very courteously provided a private room for the 

 collection, with an attendant to show it to visitors. 

 Still we had not obtained all we wished for, as the 

 hours for inspection were from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. 

 I again wrote to the director and asked that arrange- 

 ments might be made to open it until 9.30 p.m. on 

 Tuesday nights, when the director again met our 

 wishes. I have, therefore, on behalf of the com- 

 mittee, to express our thanks to the director and 

 officials for these extended acts of courtesy. — D. 

 Pratt, Sec. East London Entomological Society. 



Spiders and their Webs. — C. L. W. in 

 Science-Gossip, No. 143, pp. 251-254, speaks of 

 some Epeini spiders being in the habit of laying 

 up a store of food in the egg cocoon ' ' for the sus- 

 tenance of the young spiders from the time they leave 

 the egg till they leave the cocoon " ; the evidence in 

 support of this is the presence of "shells of the 

 larvee of the house-fly," in "one of the cocoons," 

 together with young spiders just ready to leave it. 

 I would suggest that the "shells" observed were the 

 empty pupce cases of a parasitic fly who had laid its 

 eggs within the cocoon, probably soon after it was 

 made ; the larvee of the fly had then fed upon as 

 many of the spider's eggs as they needed, and so 

 passed through their transformations, leaving the 

 empty pupte cases behind, with the unconsumed 

 remainder of the spider's eggs. No case, so far as I 

 am aware, is on record in which such a habit as that 



supposed to be proved by these empty cases in a 

 spider's cocoon has been authenticated. The destruc- 

 tion of spiders' eggs within the cocoon by the larvce 

 of parasitic insects is well known ; and if this be the 

 true explanation of C. L. W.'s case (as I believe it 

 to be), the only notable point in it is, that the para- 

 sites should have left any of the spider's eggs un- 

 touched. — O. P. Cambridge, Bloxivorth. 



New Kind of Porcupine. — At a recent meeting 

 of the Zoological Society, Dr. A. Gunther, F.R.S., 

 read a report on some of the recent additions to the 

 collection of mammalia in the British Museum, 

 amongst the more remarkable of which was a new 

 form of porcupine, from Borneo, proposed to be 

 called Trichys lipitra ; and a new marmozet, obtained 

 by Mr. T. K. Salmon, near Medellin, U.S. of 

 Columbia, to which the name Hapale leucoptis was 

 given. 



An Intra-oval Egg. — In the Museum of the 

 College of Surgeons are six specimens of so-called 

 double eggs, i.e., eggs contained in the interior of 

 larger ones. My friend Mr. C. J. Lambe-Eames 

 has submitted to me a case of a similar kind, but, if 

 I may venture to say so, of even greater interest than 

 any of the older specimens. Subjoined is the history 

 of this particular egg : — On September 26 a game 

 bantam hen of rather large size, which had only been 

 a short time in Mr. Eames's possession, and had shown 

 the peculiarity of never laying except when separated 

 from the male bird, laid an egg normal in colouring, 

 but of rather abnormal size. When that egg was 

 broken, Mr. Eames's attention was drawn to the fact 

 that a smaller egg was floating in the albumen near 

 the small end. The outer egg was of the ordinary 

 white colour, the inner one of a darker hue, re- 

 sembling those laid by the Cochin or Bramah breed. 

 It has been since called to mind that that particular 

 hen has not unfrequently laid coloured eggs of the 

 normal size. Since producing the intra-oval egg the 

 hen has laid about two more, and then ceased laying 

 entirely. The last egg was laid about the end of 

 September. In Chance's curious book on Bodily 

 Deformities, at page 69, is a record of a similar case 

 in respect to a swan's egg ; and in his appendix, Lec- 

 ture ii., another of a hen's egg in many particulars 

 strikingly similar to the case we are bringing forward. 

 The swan's egg is said by Chance to be in the Museum 

 of the College of Surgeons, but a careful search there 

 has failed to find it. From the drawing in Chance's 

 book it is evident that our specimen diff"ers from both 

 of those recorded there, as it does from all in the 

 College Museum, in the very great difference between 

 the sizes of the inner and outer egg. I bring this 

 case forward with a desire for enlightenment, and 

 with the hope that some reasonable explanation of 

 this remarkable phenomenon may be forthcoming 

 from some of the readers of SCIENCE-GOSSIP.— 

 Edward B. Aveling, D. Sc, Lond. 



