192 Foreign and Miscellaneous Intelligence. 



10. ON THE MEANS OF IMPROVING BOTH THE QUALITY AND 

 QUANTITY OF WOOL. (M. Petri.) 



A memoir upon this subject has been presented to the Academy of 

 Sciences, and reported upon by M. Coquebert Montbret. In the 

 sheep, says M. Petri, the nourishing fluids are naturally distributed 

 between the flesh, the fat, and the wool. By frequent shearing's, 

 made when the animal is young, these fluids may be determined in 

 greater abundance towards the skin, and will then nourish the 

 woollen fibre. This theory, he says, he has applied with great suc- 

 cess, and he finds that, besides increasing the quantity of wool, its 

 quality is also very much improved, and the staple rendered finer. 

 This improvement may be transmitted from one generation to ano- 

 ther, so that whole flocks may in this way be converted into fine 

 wool animals, only by taking care to reserve those animals for 

 reproduction which yield the most improved produce, and paying 

 attention, at the same time, to the choice of food, and to the other 

 circumstances and cares which are necessary. It appears that 

 M. Petri has riot as yet had time to prove the result of prolonged 

 trials conducted upon these principles*. 



11. VISION OF BIRDS OF PREY. (Dr. J. Johnson.') 



It always appeared to us most extraordinary, indeed unaccountable, 

 that birds of prey could scent carcasses at such immense distances 

 as they are said to do. We were led to scepticism on this subject 

 some twenty years ago, while observing the concourse of birds of 

 prey from every point of the horizon to a corpse floating down the 

 river Ganges, and that during the north-east monsoon, when the 

 wind blew steadily from one point of the compass for months in 

 succession. It was extremely difficult to imagine that the effluvia 

 from a putrefying body in the water could emanate in direct oppo- 

 sition to the current of air, and impinge on the olfactories of birds 

 many miles distant. Such, however, were the dicta of natural his- 

 tory, and we could only submit to the general opinion. We have 

 no doubt, now that we know the general opinion to be something 

 wrong, that it was by means of the optic rather than the olfactory 

 nerves ' that the said birds smelled out their suit.' 



The toucan is a bird which ranks next to the vulture in discerning, 

 whether by smell or by sight, the carrion on which it feeds. The 

 immense size of its bill, which is many times larger than its head, 

 was supposed to present in its honeycomb texture an extensive pro- 

 longation of the olfactory nerve, and thus to account for its power 

 of smelling at great distances ; but on accurate examination, the 

 texture above mentioned in the bill is found to be mere diploe, to 

 give the bill strength. Now the eye of this bird is somewhat larger 



* Revue Encyclopedique, xlvi. 499. 



