102 Series and Aiisweis. 



Silver Fish. — Sir, will some of your correspondents inform me, through 

 the medium of your Magazine, whether there are any such fish as silver fish, 

 and from what part of the world they are brought into this country ? I re- 

 member seeing, a year or two ago, in the pond in the botanical garden, 

 Liverpool, both golden, and (as I then understood) silver fish, in full vigour 

 apparently ; but I am induced to make the present enquiry, from having 

 recently heard that there are no such things as silver fish really; and that 

 what are generally known by that name are only the golden ones grown old, 

 and having thus lost their colour. Do not gold fish come from China ? 

 [Yes.] — W. A. a R., Bee. 8. 



A variety of the Moor Buzzard, {fig. 22.) — Sir, I send you a variety of the 

 Moor Buzzard, which I shot in 

 Marsh Gibbon Field, near Bices- 

 ter, on Nov. 12. 1 am not certain 

 that my name is right (see Latham 

 quoted by Bewick) ; but as none 

 of these birds are very common, 

 I thought it might not be unac- 

 ceptable to you. I observed it 

 late in the afternoon take its sta- 

 tion, in its usual heavy listless 

 manner, on an old ash tree, which 

 had a good command of the 

 moor, where there were abun- 

 dance of snipes, but not liking 

 the sound of my gun, it went olF. 

 The next morning, near the same 

 spot, it arose from a thick sedge, -^t 

 and being at a considerable dis- ^ 

 tance, I hoped I had shot a bit- 

 tern, being a much more likely 

 place for that bird than a bird 

 of prey. I have remarked, that 

 whenever a place is frequented by snipes, there is almost sure to be one or 

 two buzzards in the neighbourhood, although it is probable that they sel- 

 dom succeed in taking any other than birds which have been shot in the 

 body, and escaped from the sportsman apparently unhurt. — H. Bicester, 

 Nov. 1828. 



We thank our correspondent ; the bird has been stuffed by Mr. Lead- 

 beater, the eminent artist in this way, employed by the Linnean Society, 

 and is placed in the museum of Messrs. Sowerby, No. 2. Mead Place, Lam- 

 beth. Mr. Leadbeater and Mr. Sowerby consider it to be the Moor Buz- 

 zard (Falco aeruginosus, Linn.) a variety wanting the light spot on the 

 crown of the head. — Cond. 



The Animal that inhabits the Nautilus. — Sir, I would wish to be informed, 

 through the medium ofyourvaluable Magazine, as to the nature of theanimal 

 that inhabits the iVautilus, and the use it makes of the chambers ; and, if 

 Conchilla*s History of the Trochus and iVautilus in your Magazine (Vol. L 

 p. 24.) be not fabulous, the means the Trochus uses to propel itself to ren- 

 der it such a powerful enemy to the iVautilus, the former not seeming to 

 me to be so well adapted for locomotion as the latter. — A Young Con- 

 chologist. Sept. 18. 1828.; 



Mpa batdva, the U^nio batava of Lam. — I would be glad to know if there 

 be a specific distinction between this and the U'nio pictorum. Is the dis- 

 tinction sufficient to make it more than a variety ? I have received from 

 various parts of Europe the batava, rostrata, and ^'nas, and should conclude, 

 from the specimens received, notwithstanding Lamarck and other distin- 

 guished conchologists have described them as different, that they are not in- 

 titlecl so to be considered. No conchologist of this country would, if found 

 within our rivers, consider them any thing more than mere varieties. Many 



