MR. NEWMAN ON LEPIDOSIREN ANNECTENS. 73 



However widely these results may vary, they are entitled to 

 every credit; and high as are those of the two last-mentioned 

 chemists, their well-known accuracy will ensure entire confidence 

 in their statements. I am inclined to think that these great dis- 

 crepancies are owing to accidental causes, among which the 

 variable nature of the seasons, which influences so much the quan- 

 tity and intensity of all vegetable secretions, may be a principal 

 one. "With the small amount of tannin found in the Devonshire 

 galls I must confess myself much disappointed ; but I hope in the 

 ensuing summer to procure some of them at an earlier period, and 

 before they have been perforated by the Cynips. I have no doubt 

 that they would then be found to contain enough tannin to justify 

 their being collected for commercial purposes ; and if they were 

 gathered at the proper season, before the Cynips has escaped, and 

 when the gall is in its most vigorous and valuable state, another 

 good result would follow. The insect would be prevented from 

 increasing to what seems to be a mischievous extent, and a check 

 would be put to the serious injury, if not entire destruction, with 

 which the oak plantations in some of our southern counties appear 

 to be threatened. 



Note on Lepidosvren annectens, Owen. By Edward Newman, 



Esq., E.L.S. 



[Eead January 15th, 1856.] 



[Abstract.] 



Beferring to Prof. Owen's paper on Lepidosiren in the 18th 

 volume of the Society's "Transactions," the author states that 

 the conclusion at which that gentleman has arrived, that the 

 animal in question is a Eish, although controverted by some of our 

 best naturalists, appears to him to receive confirmation from one 

 or two points in its structure on which no great stress has hitherto 

 been laid. The first of these relates to the mode in which the 

 gill is covered, having only a single small external opening, in 

 which respect Lepidosiren makes a very near approach to Murcena. 

 Secondly, the two peculiar anterior teeth in the upper jaw so 

 closely resemble those of some Eishes, that the vignette represent- 

 ing these teeth in Echiodon Drummondii, given in Mr. Yarrell's 

 "History of British Eishes," might serve as well for the front 

 teeth of Lepidosiren. Thirdly, the continuous dorsal, caudal and 

 anal fin, and the absence of pectorals and ventrals, are common 



