3 04 NATURAL SCIENCE. May, 1895. 



The order forbids the taking or destroying of the eggs of any kind of 

 wild birds within specified areas for one year, and makes a general 

 prohibition for the entire county in favour of the following birds : — 

 The Bearded Titmouse or Reed Pheasant ; the Crossbill ; the White 

 or Barn Owl ; Wild Ducks and Teal of all species ; the Norfolk 

 Plover, Stone Curlew or Thick-knee ; Ruff or Reeve ; the Ring 

 Dotterel, Ring Plover or Stone Runner ; Oyster Catcher or Sea-pie ; 

 the Terns, Sea Swallows, Pearls or Dip-ears, all species ; the Great 

 Crested Grebe or Loon. Other birds there are whose names might 

 well be added to this list ; we may mention the Bittern or 

 " Buttle," as he is called, the Spotted Rail, the Water Rail, and the 

 stately Avocet. 



The Anatomy of Ornithorynchus. 



In the newly-issued number of the Proceedings of the Zoological 

 Society of London (part iv., 1894), there are two important contribu- 

 tions to our knowledge of the duck-billed Platypus. Mr. Manners- 

 Smith has gone over the muscular system carefully, correcting his 

 homologies by examination of the nervous supply. The details are 

 too technical to be entered upon here, but they raise the very interest- 

 ing question of the value of muscles from the point of view of 

 systematic zoology. It is not too much to say that there are only two 

 opinions on this matter. Those who have worked at the muscles of 

 fishes, reptiles, birds, or mammals believe them to be almost as 

 valuable as bones or nerves, though much more difficult to interpret. 

 Those who have not worked at them tend to despise their 

 value. No doubt while muscles were identified in a rather cavalier 

 fashion, and when the degeneration of muscles into ligaments was not 

 understood, there was little hope of getting valuable results. In spite 

 of the vast amount of work already published, we take muscular 

 anatomy to be one of the subjects of the future. 



Mr. F. E. Beddard deals with several interesting points in the 

 viscera. The first is the presence of a ventral mesentery. It is well 

 known that in the Dipnoi and the Amphibia the gut is suspended to 

 the ventral wall of the abdomen by a mesentery. In the frog, this is 

 conspicuous by reason of the anterior abdominal vein, which the 

 elementary student cuts through with a monotonous regularity. In 

 mammals, a short but similarly-placed ventral mesentery exists in the 

 region of the liver, and is known as the falciform ligament. Balfour, 

 in his embryology, cast doubt on the obvious comparison between 

 these two structures ; but recent investigations of Professor Howes on 

 the Australian Torpedo, and of Mr. Beddard, on Omithorhynchus and 

 Echidna, make it seem probable that the falciform ligament is a 

 remnant of the primitive ventral mesentery. Some time ago, Mr. 

 Beddard found that there was an anterior abdominal vein in Echidna ; 

 he has now found that there is a well-marked ventral mesentery, 

 although it has no vein, in Ornithorhynchus. 



