568 Letters, E.rtracts, and Notes. 



the new Palestine Museum. The Storks seen were, no doubt, 

 on their homeward journey from South Africa. 



M7\ J. Buckland's Lantern-slides of Birds. — At the Linnean 

 Society's meeting on May 6th hist, Mr. James Buckhnid 

 exhibited a series of sixty lantern-slides received from the 

 United States of America and Australia, in illustration of 

 various species of birds in imminent danger of extinction in 

 consequence of the commercial demand for their plumage as 

 means of adornment, lie pointed out the urgency of pro- 

 hibitive legislation in order to save a multitude of hirds, 

 now rare, from the reckless slaugliter by the plume-hunters. 



The first group of slides shewed the slaughter of Gulls 

 and Terns on the Atlantic seaboard of the United States, 

 so great that President Roosevelt had intervened by pro- 

 claiming certain poitions as reservations, and thereby saving 

 the Terns in these protected sanctuaries. Next were shown 

 the Snowy Herons on the Florida Keys Reservation; the 

 patrol boats for the enforcement of tlie protective regula- 

 tions ; the grave of a warden shot in the execution of 

 his dutv by a bird-hunter on forbidden territory; and the 

 nesting-habits of the Egret in Florida. 



Following these came slides of plumage-birds from 

 Oregon, California, and Venezuela; the flightless birds of 

 New Zealand ; the Birds-of-Paradise, Emu, Lyre-bird, 

 various Bower-birds; and the home of the Albatross, the Aus- 

 tralian Gannet in its rookery, closing -with " The cost of a 

 plume/' a series of slides shewing the slaughter of the parent 

 birds and tlie lingering death of the nestlings by starvation. 



Mr. Fentoit's Collection of Eggs. — We learn from 'Nature' 

 (vol. Ixxx. p. 223) that a fine collection of the eggs of British 

 Birds has been presented by Mr. R. Hay Fenton to the 

 Natural History Museum of the University of Aberdeen. 

 The collection consists of about 7000 eggs, amongst which 

 are some of Ross's Gull from the Kolyma River, and a good 

 series of Cuckoos' eggs accompanied by the foster-parents' 

 clutches. The last addition to the collection was an egg of 

 the Great Auk [Alca impennis), purchased in London. 



