GLEANINGS 47 



the right. The length of the right antler was 34 inches and of the left 33 inches, 

 while the greatest width outside was 40 inches. 



From the Oologist for December 191 1 we quote the following : — " One passenger 

 pigeon ending her life at the Zoological Garden in Cincinnati, is all that remains 

 of an American species that early in the last century swarmed over the continent 

 in flocks numbering billions. . . . With the death of this sole survivor of a bird 

 tribe, whose resting-places often covered hundreds of square miles, there will soon 

 disappear the last trace of the wild pigeons that have been slaughtered by men 

 who fed their hogs upon the carcasses they could not carry away. . . . Sad as is 

 the passing of the passenger pigeon, its lesson may avert the extinction of other 

 valuable species." 



We have been favoured by the author, Mr Hugh S. Gladstone, with a copy of 

 his "Addenda and Corrigenda to 'The Birds of Dumfriesshire,'" which formed 

 the subject of his Presidential Address to the Dumfriesshire and Galloway 

 Natural History and Antiquarian Society delivered on the 28th October last. 

 Forming a quarto pamphlet of 31 pages, this Address brings Mr Gladstone's 

 important contribution to the Avifauna of south-western Scotland up to date. 



There is an interesting paper in the Glasgow Naturalist for November 191 1 

 (Vol. IV., No. i, p. 1), by R. W. S. and H. W. Wilson, on a visit paid by them to 

 a large Cormorant Rookery on Castle Loch, Wigtownshire. They reckoned 

 the population of the colony at about 300 pairs. To ascertain the number of 

 eggs laid each season the keeper marks them with an indelible pencil. On 

 21st May 191 1, four days prior to the authors' visit, the number marked amounted 

 to 900. The total marked in 1909 was 1467. 



An Editorial note in the Ent. Mo. Mag. for December (p. 277), quotes the 

 descriptions of new Scottish forms of Erebia acthiops, Esp., Satyrus semele, L. 

 and Pararge inega:ra, L., published by Roger Verity in the Bulletin of the 

 Entomological Society of France (No. 15, Seance du 11 October 191 1). 



Norman H. Joy records (Ent. Mo. Mag. y January 191 2, p. 12) the occurrence of 

 the beetle Ohphrum nicholsoni, Donisth., at Dahvhinnie, Inverness-shire. This species 

 is not only new to the Scottish fauna, but noteworthy from its having only been 

 taken hitherto at Wicken Fen. The insect is apterous, and regarded by the author 

 as abundantly distinct from its allies O.piceum and O.fuscum. 



A paper of much importance to students of British Diptera is that by the 

 late G. H. Verrall entitled "Another Hundred New British Species of Diptera." 

 A bare list of the species was published in the April number of the Entomologist 's 

 Monthly Magazine, and the descriptive part commences in the January number. In 

 this instalment the following Scottish records may be noted : — Platyura humeralis, 

 Winn., Nairn ; Dixa nigra, Staeg., Nairn ; Tipula nodicornis, Mg., Nairn and 

 Nethy Bridge ; Rhamphomyia cidicina, Fall., Nairn ; Hilara diversipes, Strobl., 

 Braemar ; and H. nitidula, Ztt., Nairn. Most of these records are due to the 

 collecting zeal of our friend Colonel J. W. Yerbury. 



F. A. Bather {Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., Nov. 191 r, pp. 676 and 677) gives 

 particulars regarding the discovery and description of Pahrop/wmis caledonicus, the 

 type of which was unfortunately destroyed in the fire at the Kilmarnock Museum, 

 which took place a year or two ago. This species and P. nuncius, the type of 

 which is in the Swedish State Museum, are the only Scorpions known from 

 Silurian strata. 



