236 Miscellaneous. 



very rich in free carbonic acid, especially the basins near the Wehnder 

 paper-mill, and there is here found a rich and luxuriant vegetation, 

 which in spring appears several entire weeks earlier, and continues 

 in autumn much later than at other spots of the same district. Dr. 

 Schleiden thinks that the free carbonic acid in the water exercises a 

 favourable influence on the vegetation, which certainly may be the 

 case ; for observations have shown that by the vegetation of plants in 

 solar light, the addition of a very small quantity of carbonic acid in 

 the surrounding atmosphere produces a much more powerful disen- 

 gagement of oxygen than takes place in the common atmosphere. — 

 Meyeris Report for 1837 in Wiegmann's Archiv, Part III. 1838. 



HYBRIDITY INFERNS. 



M. Martens observed in the Botanical Garden of Louvain, a fern 

 which he regarded as a hybrid between Gymnogramma calomelanos and 

 G. chrysophylla, to which Bory de St. Vincent proposes to apply the 

 name of G. Martensii. At the same time the latter gentleman ob- 

 serves that this hybrid formation appears to occur quite commonly 

 in nature, for he had received several well-preserved specimens of this 

 plant through L'Herminier from Guadaloupe, where it grows in na- 

 ture between the two above-mentioned Gymnogrammce. He also 

 enumerates several other ferns which might be considered as hybrids* 

 which are only grounded on supposition : to these however Dr. Meyen 

 rather inclines to assent. — Ibid. 



AFFINITIES OF THE CERATOPHYLLACEA. 



Mr. Asa Gray has recently published in the ' Lyceum of Nat. Hist.' 

 of New York, a paper on the affinities of the genus Ceratophyllum ; 

 it appears to him that a great similarity prevails between the embryos 

 of the genera Ceratophyllum and Nelumbium, which he endeavours 

 specially to demonstrate, and then places the Ceratophyllacece in the 

 immediate vicinity of the Cabombacea and Nelumbiacece. The me- 

 moir contains no new observations, nor is there anything new re- 

 specting the structure of the Ceratophyllacece. 



Dr. Schleiden in a paper published in one of the late numbers of 

 the ' Linnsea/ admits only one species of Ceratophyllum, and calls this 

 C. vulgare ; a long series of observations are enumerated to prove 

 this view. This paper also contains some remarks on the structure 

 and affinities of this family. — Ibid. 



STRIPED HYENA, (H. Vulgaris.) 



A litter has lately been bred in the Zoological Gardens at Liver- 

 pool. "The animals copulated after being together a fortnight. 



