BIOLOGY. 325 



produce contraction of the tissues, and afterward drjang them 

 rapidly l)y artificial heat. The drying is best effected by placing 

 them upon an open cloth stretched tightly upon a frame, and sup- 

 ported a few feet above a stove. Care should be taken not to 

 raise the heat too high, as the green shades change to red at a 

 temperature near that of boiling water. By this process I have 

 succeeded in preserving the delicate shades of red, jiurple, and 

 orange, of the species found on the coast of New England, speci- 

 mens of which are in the Museum of Yale College. The same 

 process is equally applicable to Echini and Crustacea." 



Silk from Eggs of Fish. — A French savant has lately discovered 

 that certain fish contain eggs enveloped in veritable silk cocoons. 

 Each e^g, measures tliirty-five centimetres long by thirteen broad, 

 and weighs two hundred and foity grammes, ami is covered with 

 silky filaments, which may be em])loyed in weaving. 



The Little Folks of Africa. — The small people of Equatorial 

 Africa, recently discovered by Du Chaillu, about 1° and 2° south 

 latitude and 12° east longitude, are described as of migratory 

 habits, and as changing their temporary shelter under trees from 

 one place to another. While the inhabitants of this mountain 

 region are lighter in color than those of the sea-shore, these 

 Obongo are still less dark. They have only short tufts of hair 

 ui)on their heads, and are thus strikingly distinguished from the 

 settled inhabitants, who wear large turrets of hair ujjon their 

 heads. " The following are the measurements I was enabled to 

 make : The only adult male measured four feet and six inches, 

 but as one of the women reached five feet and one quarter of an 

 inch (she being extraordinarilj' tall), I have no doubt some of the 

 men are equally tall, and some perhaps taller. The other women 

 I measured had the following height: four feet one inch, four 

 feet seven and one-quarter inches, four feet feet five inches, and 

 the smallest, four feet and one-quarter of an inch." 



PALiEONTOLOGICAL SUMMARY. 



Gigantic Dinosaurian in the Cretaceous of New Jersey. — E. D. 

 Cope exhibited the remains of a gigantic extinct Dinosaurian- from 

 the cretaceous green sand of New Jersey, viz., portions of the 

 under jaw with teeth, of the scapular arch, including supposed 

 clavicles, two humeri, left femur, right tibia and fibula, numerous 

 phalanges, lumbai;, sacral, and caudal vertebras, and numerous 

 undetei'mined fragments. Remains were found about two miles 

 south of Barnesboro,' Gloucester County, N. J. The bones were 

 taken fi'om about twenty feet below the surface in the toj? of the 

 " chocolate " bed, which immediately underlies the green stratum, 

 which is of such value as manure. 



The discovery of this animal fills a hiatus in the cretaceous 

 fauna, revealing the carnivorous enemy of the great herbivorous 

 Hadrosaurus, as the Dinodon was related to the Trachodon of the 

 Nebraska beds, and the Megalosaurus to the Iguanodon of the 

 European Wealden and Oolite. In size this creature equalled the 

 Megalosaurus, and with it and Dinodon constituted the most for- 

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