324 MISCELLANY, 



The Cinereous Sea-eagle a Straggler in Yorkshire.— The Cinereous Sea- 

 eagle (Falco albicilla), though unknown on our coast, has been a straggler into 

 Yorkshire. An individual was shot at Heywra Park, belonging to Sir W. A. 

 Ingilby, of Ripley Castle, in this county, and was presented by that gen- 

 tleman to the Scarborough Museum. — Patrick Hawkridge, Scarborough, Aug. 

 7, 1837. 



Collection of Shells purchased, by the British Museum, op W. J. Bro- 

 derip, Esq. — A grant of £ 1,575 has been voted by the House of Commons to 

 enable the trustees of the British Museum to purchase the collection of shells 

 belonging to W. J. Broderip, Esq., offered by him at the price of 1,500 guineas, 

 and valued by Messrs. Turner and Sowerby at £\,6±0 2s. 6d. Mr. Gray 

 says : — " The collection consists of nearly 3,000 specimens, and contains about 

 200 species, or very distinct varieties, that are altogether wanting in the already 

 extensive collection of the British Museum. Such is the beauty of the specimens, 

 in consequence of the great attention paid by Mr. Broderip to the purchase of 

 none but the finest that could be procured, and so remarkable are the deviations 

 in form and colouring in the several series of the more variable species, that 

 nearly every individual specimen of the remaining portion will also be valuable 

 to our collection, either in replacing a much inferior specimen, or as rendering 

 more complete the series which we already possess. The duplicates to be 

 displaced will be few, and will, for the reasons above given, be taken in every 

 instance from our present collection, and not from among the specimens in the 

 new acquisition. A very large proportion of the species contained in this col- 

 lection, and wanting in the British Museum, are among the rarest shells that 

 are known to exist, and many are absolutely unique. — Magazine of Zoology and 

 Botany, No. ix., Aug. 1837- 



Comparative Insensibility of Fishes and Insects. — People are apt to 

 reprobate the cruelty of the angler's sport, and that of the entomologist in trans- 

 fixing a live insect on a pin. But in fact the organisation of these creatures is 

 so low, that they really feel little, if at all, an injury which would cause terrific 

 pain to a bird, a quadruped, or a man. It is well known that animals cannot 

 eat when in pain ; but the Pike will carry off a large hook and retain it in its 

 stomach several months, apparently without suffering in the least from the 

 intrusion. Nay, they will chase other fish almost the moment they hav» 

 broken the fishing-line. As regards the insects, they bear worse matters yet 

 more heroically. The other evening we entered a boat-house the sides and roof 

 of which were covered with Old-lady Moths (Phalcena maura, Linn.). We 

 transfixed a number of these to the wall with pins, without their offering the 

 slightest resistance. It is true that even a slight touch of their wings would 

 immediately cause them to flutter with all their might, and then it was difficult 



