468 NE WS [DECEMBER. 



(6) Botanical collections, especially of the mosses, hepaticae, and flowering 

 plants, not including the grasses and sedges. 



(7) A large series of photographs illustrating the geology and physical 

 geography of Patagonia. 



The geology will be treated of by Mr. Hatcher, the Tertiary invertebrates by 

 Dr. Ortmann, the fossil vertebrates by Messrs. W. B. Scott and Hatcher, and 

 the recent birds by Mr. W. E. D. Scott. 



At the meeting of the Biological Section of the New York Academy of 

 Sciences on October 9, Professor H. F. Osborn gave an account of the explora- 

 tion of the American Museum party in Southern Wyoming, which resulted in 

 the discovery of Dinosaur remains ; Professor E. B. Wilson reported the dis- 

 covery of females of Polypterus in Egypt, but with unripe ovaries, and the 

 rediscovery of the branchiate Oligochaete Alma; and Professor Dean reported 

 finding on the Californian coast freshly hatched young of Bdellostoma, and 

 many stages of Chimaera collieri. 



Professor Franz von Hohnel of Vienna has undertaken a botanical explora- 

 tion in Brazil. 



In Nature for November 9 Mr. John C. Willis gives an account of the 

 facilities now available in Ceylon for botanical research. 



We learn from the Scientific American that the Duke of Abruzzi has found 

 an important mistake in the last map of Franz Josef Land. He says that Cape 

 Flora is really ten geographical miles east of the post assigned on Jackson's 

 map. The map of Payer was riddled by Jackson, who complained of its 

 inaccuracies, but he has himself assigned the wrong position to his own camp. 



On the Skeat expedition Mr. Evans found several species of Peripatus in 

 Kalantan. As the distribution of this animal is of peculiar interest we may note 

 also that in 1886 Mr. R. Hoi'st recorded its occurrence from East Sumatra on 

 the other side of the Malaka Strait. See Nature, November 9, 1899, p. 31. 



Science reports that Mr. R. E. Snodgrass, assistant in entomology in 

 Stanford University, and Mr. A. H. Heller, have returned from a successful ten 

 months' collecting trip to the Galapagos Islands. The collections of birds, 

 fishes, insects, and spiders, are said to be large. 



In the judgment of Major Ronald Ross, who has now returned from Africa, 

 the future of the west coast will be assured as soon as the colonial authorities 

 take steps similar to those now in operation in Sierra Leone, to destroy the 

 virulent mosquito. 



Geheimrath Prof, von Zittel of Miinchen is arranging to send a scientific 

 expedition to Patagonia. 



We learn from Science that Mr. O. F. Cook of the Division of Botany, 

 U.S. Department of Agriculture, has been sent to examine the plant products 

 of Puerto Rico in reference to the possibility of introducing new and useful 

 tropical plants into the island. He is accompanied by Mr. G. N. Collins as 

 photographer, and Mr. G. P. Gall sent by the Smithsonian Institution to collect 

 material for the National Herbarium. 



Nature reports that another British exploring expedition to Abyssinia has 

 been arranged, and will leave England at once for nine months. The objects 

 are science and sport. 



The annual conversazione of the Geologists' Association, London, was held 

 on November 3, and was fairly well attended in spite of the inclement 

 weather. Among the more striking exhibits were a fine series of concretionary 

 structures brought together by Dr. G. Abbott ; the skin and skull of Neomylodon 

 listed lent by the La Plata Museum, and shown by A. Smith Woodward ; a 

 series of pebbles from Derbyshire compared with a corresponding series from 



