No. 4.] MISCELLANEOUS. 249 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



A Very Rare Bird. — Yesterday Mr. Vennor was so fortu- 

 Date as to purchase from a Canadian in the Bonsecoeur Market, 

 Montreal, a beautiful frozen specimen of the dark variety of 

 the Gyrfalcon. This is a very rare bird, and one that is being 

 at present much discussed by our leading American Ornitholo- 

 gists. Up to the present only two other specimens have been 

 taken in Canada, so far as known, and these are in our Museum 

 of Natural History. Apart from these, there is one specimen in 

 the National Museum of Washington, one in the Boston Museum 

 and two in the collection of Mr. Boardman of St. Stephen's. 

 These, with Mr. Vennor's recently procured specimen, make a 

 sum total of but seven individuals of this species known in col- 

 lections in the whole of North America. Great enquiries have 

 been made by United States naturalists for this bird in the flesh, 

 as it is yet undecided whether it is a valid species or merely a 

 dark stage of the ordinary form of Gyrfalcon of Iceland and 

 Greenland. For these reasons Mr. Vennor has transmitted the 

 bird entire to Boston, where such men as Brewer, Allan. Deane, 

 Bailey and other leaders in American Ornithology will study 

 its anatomy in detail, and probably arrive at some important 

 conclusions. The specimen, however, is not to be lost to our 

 Canadian collections, but when preserved and mounted by a 

 skilful taxidermist will be returned to Montreal. — Ed. Can. Nat. 



March 15th, 1877. 



Note on a Specimen of Diploxylon, from the Coal 

 formation of Nova Scotia. — By J. W. Dawson, LL.D., 

 F.R.S., F.G.S. — The author described the occurrence in Coal- 

 measure sandstone at the South Joggins of an erect stump of a 

 Sigillarian tree 12 feet in length. It originated in a coaly seam 

 6 inches thick, and terminated below in spreading roots; below 

 the coal seam was an under-clay 3 feet 4 inches thick, separating 

 it from an underlying seam of coarse coal. The stem, which 

 tapered from about 2J feet in diameter near the base to 1J- foot, 

 at the broken end, was a sandstone cast, and exhibited an internal 

 axis about 2 inches in diameter, consisting of a central pith 

 cylinder, replaced by sandstone, about -| inch in diameter, and of 

 two concentric coats of scalariform tissue, the inner one JU inch 



