300 Reconciliation of apparent Discrepancies in the Mode 



Want of leisure prevents my continuing some experiments 

 connected with the action of electricity on adult vegetables ; 

 but, should I again resume them, and arrive at any satisfac- 

 tory or interesting results, I shall be happy to make them 

 public in the pages of this Magazine. 



22. Wilmington Square, May 9. 1837. 



Art. III. On the Reconciliation of certain apparent Discrepancies 

 observable in the Mode in tvhich the seasonal and progressive 

 Changes of Colour are effected in the Fur of Mammalians and 

 Feathers of Birds ; with various Observations on Moulting. By 

 Edward Blyth, Esq. 



{Concluded from p. 263.) 



It is a curious fact, that many dentirostral birds, as the 

 song-thrush and the grey flycatcher, actually commence the 

 renovation of their nestling body plumage before the primaries 

 have attained their complete growth ; and it is most interesting, 

 and highly instructive, to observe the relationships of affinity 

 indicated by a variety of circumstances connected with these 

 changes in different groups. Thus, the Lanius Collurio, as if in 

 reference to this early moulting in the thrushes and flycatchers, 

 puts forth a series of new feathers along each side of the breast 

 almost immediately after quitting the nest, these being of pre- 

 cisely the same hue as the rather more downy feathers that 

 are cast ; and I have incidentally noticed, in a young male of 

 this species which had been captured and caged, that the 

 feathers which, on its being first imprisoned, it had rubbed 

 off its forehead, were succeeded by others of the same brown 

 colour, with similar transverse bars ; whereas it is well known 

 that, in a young cock bullfinch^ if a few of the breast feathers 

 are pulled out, even before it leaves the nest, these are replaced 

 by some of the colour indicative of its sex, in adult livery : 

 whence this method is constantly resorted to by the dealers to 

 ascertain the sex of their nestling birds. The very partial 

 moulting, however, of the young shrike, above noticed, appears 

 to be quite unconnected with its subsequent change, for I find 

 that, about October, these birds renew their whole plumage, 

 and assume the adult livery. 



proportions as in water. The conversion of starch and sugar of milk into 

 grape sugar depends upon the combination of both substances with a fresh 

 quantity of water, or, rather, of oxygen and hydrogen, by the action of sul- 

 phuric acid, as in the process of aetherification ; or by spongy platinum, or 

 fermentation, in the production of acetification ; they undergoing no further 

 change." 



