Miscellaneous, 461 



the kitchen as if to remind her of the neglect, and waits quietly, but 

 with a searching eye, during the time the meat is cutting up, until 

 it is fed. It is amusing to observe this bird catch flies : he remains 

 very quiet, as if asleep, and on a fly passing him, it is snapped uj) in 

 his beak in an instant. The only time I observed any manifestation 

 of anger in him was when the *' Mooruks" were introduced into the 

 yard where he was parading about : these rapid, fassy, noisy birds 

 running about his range excited his indignation ; for on their coming 

 near him, he slightly elevated the brilliant feathers of tbe head, the 

 eyes became very brilliant, he ruffled his feathers, and clattered his 

 mandibles as if about to try their sword-like edge upon the intruding 

 *' Mooruks ;" buthis anger subsided with these demonstrations, except 

 an occasional flapping of his powerful wings. One day, however, on 

 one of the '^Mooruks" approaching too near him, he seized it with 

 his mandibles by the neck, on which the "Mooruk" ran away and 

 did not appear in any way injured. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



On the Electrical Organs of Fishes. By M. Schultze. 



The remarkable researches of M. Bilharz upon the Malapterurus 

 commenced a new era in the history of the electrical fishes, by the 

 discovery of the so-called electrical nervous plates. The subsequent 

 works of MM. KoUiker, Ecker, Kupffer, and Keferstein tend to 

 show that these plates exist in all the electrical fishes. M. Schultze 

 now furnishes us with more exact details upon these interesting 

 organs in the Torpedo. 



In their microscopic appearance, the prisms of the Torpedo exactly 

 resemble those of the Gymnotus ; nevertheless the employment of 

 the microscope soon shows some remarkable differences of structure 

 in them. The transverse partitions, which in the Gymnoti are 

 formed by fibrous conjunctive tissue, present a far more delicate tex- 

 ture in theTorpedos, being composed of gelatinous conjunctive tissue 

 or mucous tissue {Schleimgewebe). This difference, however, is in 

 relation to the great development which the gelatinous conjunctive 

 tissue in general acquires in the organs of the Plagiostomi. These 

 partitions are traversed by vessels and nerves, like the more resistant 

 and fibrous walls of the prisms. In the spaces enclosed between the 

 gelatinous transverse septa, other transverse partitions, of far greater 

 solidity, are arranged ; these are, properly speaking, the transverse 

 septa hitherto indicated by different authors. A gelatinous partition 

 therefore alternates regularly with a more solid one ; and in this 

 latter M. Schultze recognizes an electrical plate. 



Hitherto the gelatinous partitions (the true septa, according to 

 M. Schultze) were regarded as spaces filled with a liquid, in which 

 the nerves and vessels were freely suspended. Pacini, and after him 

 Remak and Kolliker, perceived that in each of these supposed spaces 

 the nerves form a delicate network applied against the lower surface 

 of each of the solid partitions {electrical plates of Schultze). This 

 arrangement is confirmed by Schultze, who says that the nerves 



