666 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



with golden yellow, and in violet contrasted with blue. It learned 

 by experience, and did so more quickly the second time than the first. 

 But it had great difficulty in learning to distinguish a beautiful cobalt 

 blue from black. 



Tuberculosis in Guinea-pigs.* — A. Calmette, C. Guerin and M. 

 Breton, following up their experimental work on tuberculosis in cattle, 

 have made a series of experiments on guinea-pigs, inducing artificial 

 tuberculosis by infection thi'ough the alimentary canal. They found 

 that when young or adult guinea-pigs were thus infected, according to a 

 method they fully describe, they invariably developed tuberculosis, and 

 that the lesions they exhibited were chiefly pulmonary and gangUonic. 

 The spleen and visceral organs were rarely implicated, though tracheo- 

 bronchial adenopathy and tubercular arthritis were frequent. Bacilli 

 killed by heat or by maceration in alcohol proved toxic to the guinea- 

 pig through the alimentary canal. The same bacilH killed by heat or 

 chemically treated and absorbed by the alimentary canal in minimal 

 doses and at sufficient intervals conferred a marked resistance to virulent 

 infection. 



Wolves of Spain.f — A. C. Latorre regards the tyi^Q Canis lupus li. 

 as approximately the same stem as the Castilian wolf, but of a paler skin , 

 and with other differences of coloration. Both forms are gigantic 

 compared with the one inhabiting the south-east corner of the peninsula, 

 which in size and appearance resembles a jackal. The three forms 

 C. lupus lupus, C. I. signatus sub-sp. n., C. I. deitanus sub-sp. n., are 

 described. 



Kidney of African Elephant. J — A. Pettit describes the anatomy of 

 this organ, and in particular calls attention to its interlobular muscular 

 tissue which appears to be specially marked. The kidney is a plurilobed 

 organ characterised by the development of a contractile partition system. 



Perdrix montana Brisson.§ — E. Olivier calls attention to the 

 variations of the grey partridge {Stariia cinerea Lath.), and in particular 

 discusses the case of Perdrix montana, described as a new species by 

 Brisson. Olivier states that this remarkable form appears by chance 

 here and there at long intervals amongst other Perdrix ; there is always 

 the same constancy in its colorations, but it does not breed its own 

 type. It is a variety whose origin is very puzzling. 



New Reptiles from Karroo Beds of Natal. || — R. Broom describes 

 a small collection of reptilian bones from the Karroo Beds of Natal. 

 Most of the specimens belong to a large Dicynodon, which proves to be 

 a new species, Dicynodon ingens, and there is also a specimen of a new 

 species of Therocephalian, Scymnosaunis warreni. Three Natal species 

 are now known, and though they belong to well-known genera, they are 

 all very distinct from the species known in Cape Colony. This is a 



* Ann. Inst. Pasteur, xxi. (1907) pp. 401-16. 



t Bol. R. Soc. Espan. Hist. Nat. Madrid, vii. (1907) pp. 193-7 (1 pi.). 



: C.R. Soc. Biol. Paris, Ixii. (1907) pp. 712-14. 



§ Bull. Soc. Zool. France, xxxii. (1907) pp. 72-3 (1 fig.) 



II Ann. Natal Govt. Museum, i. (1907) part 2, pp. 167-72 (1 pl.).^ 



