454 Natural-Historical Collections. 



5th, Elephas pygmceug, the smallest species known, since the crown of the 

 tooth figured by Mr, Fischer is only 4 in. 5 li. in length, 2 in. 6 li. in width, and 

 3 in. 8 li. in height. It was found at Ratmir, on the banks of the Moscowa, 

 and near the little river of Tcherka, in the district of SerpoukbofF. 



The genus Rhinoceros has only offered to Mr. Fischer the species known un- 

 der the name of Rhinoceros Hchorhinus, and Rhinoceros antiquitafis or Sibe» 

 ricus. It exists in the alluvium of the Protva, in the environs of Moscow, near 

 the mouth of the Lena, and of the Yama, and in the government of Simbirsk. 

 One of these horns is cited, which was 32 inches in length. 



The alluvium of Russia does not contain the fossil bones of any gnawing ani- 

 mals. I\Ir. Fischer cannot decidedly state if the bones of a lorus, which were 

 brought from Tartary by Dr. Pander, are really fossil. 



With respect to the reptiles, Mr. Fischer is the first who mentions the existence 

 of their remains in the soil of Russia ; he gives figures of a sheU and several 

 bones, which, from the thickness of the scales, he supposes was a marine species, 

 and which he for the present denominates Chelonia radiata. He is not aware of 

 the locality of these bones ; but they are imbedded in a hard clay from Si- 

 beria. 



He terminates his memoir, by the description of a fish, of which he gives a figure, 

 and which appears to be related to the Gadi, and by some words on a vertebra 

 of three inches in diameter, which he cannot approximate to that of any known 

 species. This fish is imbedded in a limestone, penetrated by oxide of copper, from 

 Siberia. The vertebra is entirely siliceous, or perhaps, as he says, its impression 

 has been replaced by a siliceous mould. It has been found in the island of 

 Taman, in the Black Sea. 



Silver Mines in Sweden. — An inhabitant of Stockholm, M. Segerman, has 

 communicated to the Board of Finance of Sweden, a memoir, in which he states 

 that he has discovered, in the mountains of the province of Calmar, mines of 

 silver whose veins are many miles in extent, and whose produce will suffice to 

 redeem all the Swedish bills without any need of a foreign loan. — Bull, de Soc. 

 Geoff. May, 1830. 



Notice of curious Mechanical Feats of a small Species of Spider, (Aranea 

 extensa?) By the Rev. William Turner. From the Transactions of the 

 Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon^ 

 Tyne. Vol. I. Part I — On the 1st of the present month, I attended, with 

 several other gentlemen, the trial of a new steam-engine, built by Mr. Robert 

 Stephenson, for the Liverpool Railway ; at the close of which our friend and as- 

 sociate, Mr. Mackreth, observed to me, that though Mr. S. was a great me- 

 chanic, he could show me one still more extraordinary. On calling upon him 

 the next morning, he brought out a tumbler glass, which he had inverted on the 

 table over the sprig of a laurustinus bush, on which he had observed a very small 

 spider. Supposing that it might want air, he had slipped under the edge of 

 the glass a small roll of paper. In less than three days the little animal had fill- 

 ed the interior of the glass with minute, almost invisible, threads, by means of 

 which it had raised the sprig into the middle of the glass ; and, not content with 

 this, had raised also the coil of paper, which by some accident had slipped from 

 under the edge ; after this, it laid, upon one of the upper leaves, a large ball of 

 eggs, and having thus completed the ultimate object of its existence, it died, and 

 fell into the meshes of its own web. This glass, with its contents, I have now, 

 by Mr. Mackreth's permission, the honour of exhibiting to the Society. How 

 this little artist should have accomplislied the herculean task of raising a weight 

 several hundred times greater than itself, and for what purpose it should have 

 done this, are questions which may well deserve consideration. I have not ob- 

 served any similar feat recorded of spiders in the volume on Insect Architecture 

 in the Library of Entertaining Knowledge. 



