Letters, Announcements, ^-c. 339 



(Bericht der Akad. d. Wissenscli. Berlin, 1879; often men- 

 tioned and well spoken of in Hoek^s Pycnogonidse of the 

 ' Challenger' Expedition), besides various papers on African 

 ornithology jiublished in the ' Ornithologisches Centralblatt ' 

 and in the ' Journal fiir Ornithologie/ A short account 

 of the birds collected by Boehm has been published by Dr. 

 Schalow (J. f. O. 1883, p. 337) ; a second paper will follow 

 in the next number of that periodical. 



To Boehm are dedicated the genus Boehmia of Hoek and 

 many species of Eastern African birds. 



News of Dr. Finsch. — Our excellent correspondent Dr. O. 

 Finsch of Bremen, who disappeared from Europe somewhat 

 mysteriously more than a year ago, and was generallv 

 supposed to have been sent off by Prince Bismark to take 

 possession of New Guinea for the Fatherland, writes to us 

 from Mioko, Duke-of-York Island, under date of the 27th of 

 February last. Dr. Finsch preserves a judicious reticence as 

 to the exact business he has been transacting, but admits that 

 he has " travelled a good deal in New Guinea, and visited 

 parts of that island where scarcely any white men have been 

 before.'^ But he also announces an important ornithological 

 discovery. At Cooktown, in the preceding month, he had 

 purchased a fine collection of birds just made on the southern 

 slopes of the Owen-Stanley range, in New Guinea, at an 

 elevation of from 7000 to 8000 feet. Amongst many rare 

 birds in this collection were some quite new and of great 

 beauty — a new Paradise-bird of prevailing blue colour and 

 a new form allied to Astrapia, both generically distinct, and 

 a most wonderful neAV Amblyornis, with a bright flame- 

 coloured crest. These novelties have been transmitted to 

 Dr. A. B. Meyer, of Dresden, for description. 



New Expeditions. — Mr. H. O. Forbes, having issued his 

 ' Naturalist's Wanderings in the Eastern Archipelago,' with 

 a full account of his last journey, has started again for the 

 East, this time having the Owen-Stanley range, in New 

 Guinea, for his principal object. He will call at Taentre 



