HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



89 



themselves ; when found, they were twined together 

 like the* strands of a rope, and I observed that one, 

 after being separated from the others, bent slowly 

 round until it was twisted on itself. The bird was 

 very much emaciated, and no wonder, as, in addition 

 to the worms in the legs, it had a large fibrous 

 tumour in the back." The above extract is from 

 some "zoological notes" contributed by me to the 

 " Proc." of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club, 

 vol. viii. p. 288. Lately — February 27th, 1878 — I 

 had a similar case, but in a different species of bird, — 

 an immature female of the Water-hen {Gallinula 

 chloropus). When skinning the legs near where the 

 muscles end and the tendons begin, there was a quantity 

 of gelatinous matter which, as the bird was ap- 

 parently healthy and in good condition — not like the 

 Grebe in that respect, — induced me to examine it 

 carefully, when I found in both legs a number of the 

 same worms, or a nearly allied species, to that found 

 in the Grebe. The chief difference was in their not 

 being so regularly spiral, various sizes intermixed, 

 and not in such compact clusters. Although some of 

 them were entwined and interlaced together, others, 

 when the lower part of the tibia was pressed from 

 below upwards, came out singly amongst the ten- 

 dons, with a spiral motion like that of a corkscrew. 

 Perhaps some of the readers of Science-Gossip may, 

 from the above imperfect description, be ahle to 

 identify the species to which they belong. — Andrew 

 Brotherston, Kelso. 



The Solitaire. — Prof. Newton recently drew 

 the attention of the Zoological Society to the state- 

 ment of Leguat that every Solitaire {Pezophaps soli- 

 laria) carried a stone in its gizzard, and exhibited 

 one of three stones found by Mr. Caldwell associated 

 with the remains of as many birds of that species in 

 the caves of Rodriguez. 



The National Entomological Exhibition 

 at the Westminster Aquarium well deserves a visit 

 from every entomologist who has the opportunity. 

 The committee who have arranged it are well known 

 entomologists, and it is not too much to say that 

 there never was a series of collections of insects like 

 this got together before. The insect fauna of Great 

 Britain and other countries are shown ; insects bene- 

 ficial and injurious to man ; insect productions useful 

 in commerce, &c. Nearly all the collections are 

 sent by persons living in and near the Metropolis. 

 The few exceptions to this rule are Mr. Prest, of the 

 York Natural History Society ; Sir Thomas Mon- 

 creiffe, who sends a fine collection of Scotch insects ; 

 and Lord Walsingham, of Merton Hall, Thetford, 

 whose collection of preserved larvae, with their food- 

 plants, is one of the most interesting and beautiful 

 objects in the exhibition : the specimens were all pre- 

 pared by his lordship's own hands, and they repre- 

 sent a great amount of labour and study. Nearly 



every class in the exhibition is well represented ; the 

 Lepidoptera naturally predominating on account of 

 their greater beauty. The collections of Mr. Well- 

 man, Mr. Stevens, and Mr. Farn are especially good, 

 while among the micro-lepidoptera, Mr. Machin's 

 and Dr. Harper's collections are remarkably good : 

 one case of the latter gentleman's contains upwards 

 of 3,000 specimens. Coleoptera and Hymenoptera 

 are also well represented, the latter by Mr. F. Smith, 

 of the British Museum, whose collection is the result 

 of forty years' labour. The life histories of insects, 

 illustrated by Messrs. Adams, of Enfield, the cases 

 showing the habits of insects, prepared by Messrs. 

 Eedle & Son, and the foreign lepidoptera of Messrs. 

 Cook & Son are highly meritorious. 



The Odontophore in Moi.lusca. — At a recent 

 meeting of the Zoological Society, Mr. P. Geddes 

 read a memoir on the mechanism of the odontophore 

 in certain mollusca. In this paper the view of Cuvie r 

 — that the movements of the radula depend upon those 

 of the underlyingcartilages — was substantially revived, 

 arguments being adduced against the more recent 

 theory of Professor Huxley, that it runs like a chain- 

 saw, the cartilages merely forming a pulley-block. 

 The use of bacteria as food by Lymnccus was also 

 described by the author in this paper. 



"The Fins of Elasmobranchs, with Con- 

 siderations on the Nature and Homologies 

 ok Vertebrate Limbs." — This is the title of a 

 paper by Prof. Mivart, read before the Zoological 

 Society, wherein the author detailed his dissections 

 of the fins of Elasmobranchs, which dissections had 

 convinced him that the paired and azygous fins are of 

 similar nature. He represented them all to have 

 resulted from the centripetal growth and evalescence 

 of a primitively distinct series of cartilaginous rays 

 developed in longitudinal folds, of which one was 

 dorsal, one ventral, and two were lateral. He also 

 advocated the view that the limb-girdles result from 

 the further centripetal growth of the evalescing limb- 

 cartilages, which growth seeks a point d'tippni, the 

 pectoral limb-girdles in fishes shooting upwards and 

 downwards as well as inwards to obtain a firm support, 

 and at the same time to avoid the visceral cavity. 

 He contended that the Archipterygium was not to be 

 sought for in Ceratodus, which he by no means 

 regarded as a primitive type of structure, but rather 

 in Rata and especially in the ventrals of Polyodon. 

 He objected to Gegenbauer's view that the meta- 

 pterygium formed the limb-axis of the cheiropterygium, 

 advocating instead the propterygium, or, if not that, 

 then the mesopterygium. He cited the varying con- 

 ditions described as evidences of the presence of an 

 innate intra-organic polar force as the main agent in 

 morphological modifications. 



The Importation of Humble Bees into New 

 Zealand. — There would probably be no great 



