Miscellaneous. 



for one season cut off from the society of the other sex was sufficient 

 to cause a temporary assumption of a plumage resembling that of a 

 male, and that as long as that disguise continued, although she was 

 no longer debarred from sexual intercourse, the natural result did not 

 follow at the first moult after the admission of the male. She ap- 

 pears in her proper colours and proves extraordinarily prolific, pro- 

 ducing double the ordinary complement of eggs. 



I conclude from the above fact, that the assumption by female 

 birds of the plumage resembling that of the male does not (as is the 

 opinion of many physiologists) depend upon a derangement of the 

 generative organs. George Cookson. 



SPIDERS DISCHARGED FROM THE EYE. 



The 'American Journal of the Medical Sciences' for July 1843, 

 p. 302, contains the following extraordinary relation, bv A. Lopez, 

 M.D., Mobile, Ala. 



I was requested, Feb. 5, 1840, to visit a young lady, from whose 

 mother I received the following statement : — The patient had left the 

 city of Charleston to visit a friend in the country. On the night of 

 the 29th of January, while conversing in bed, she was sensible that 

 some object had fallen from the ceiling upon her cheek, just below 

 the inferior lid. In the course of the night she was awakened by a 

 feeling of intense pain in her left eye, which continued at intervals 

 until morning, when the eye was discovered to be inflamed. Ordi- 

 nary means were applied, and during the morning, feeling intense ir- 

 ritation, she rubbed the lids together upon the ball, and removed two 

 fragments, which were readily recognised as the parts of a spider. 

 Her alarm became very great, and was much heightened when the 

 same thing was repeated in the afternoon. She returned to Charles- 

 ton on the 2nd of February. When I paid my first visit on the 5th, 

 the following was her condition : the right eye unaffected ; the left 

 turgid, inflamed and weeping ; and there had been removed from it 

 that morning a spider, imbedded in a mucous covering. It was en- 

 tire, with the exception of two legs. The two preceding days before 

 I had seen her, three others had been removed, and were now exhi- 

 bited to me. I immediately submitted the eye to a close examina- 

 tion, without being enabled to discover the minutest portion of any 

 foreign substance. I visited her daily until the 19th, and at every 

 visit I removed either an entire or dismembered spider from the same 

 eye. Between the 5th and 19th I invited, to an examination of the 

 case. Professors Geddings and Dickson, and Doctors Bellinger and 

 Wurdeman. Dr. Dickson, on one or two occasions, also removed 

 these objects from the patient's eye. I made, assisted by Professor 

 Geddings, the most minute scrutiny, with a view of discovering — 

 first, whether there could possibly exist a nidus within the orbit for 

 these animals ; secondly, whether a sac containing their ova was 

 there concealed ; and thirdly, if any communication between the eye 

 and the nose could account for their appearance. For these purposes 

 the superior and inferior palpebrse were everted with great care, 

 traversed thoroughly with a blunt probe, and afterwards I threw in- 

 jections around the internal lining, but all to no avail. The anterior 



