THE OOLOGIST. 



39 



mated by holding the egg above one's 

 head. The object of this is to keep 

 the bits of bone that still remain in 

 the egg afloat and beside the drill- 

 hole. In order to promote this gravi- 

 tation, water should be inserted into 

 the egg, over and over again. When 

 every bit of bone is gone, and you 

 have crawled clear inside the egg to 

 make sure of this happy consumma- 

 tion, the pieces of paper may be soak- 

 ed away at your leisure. (If your head 

 is too big to go inside the egg, — mine 

 is, — it will sometimes do as well to 

 shake the egg violently. One's train- 

 ed ear will make the test.) 



A valuable modification of this 

 "method of extracting tough embryos 

 is perfectly successful in the saving 

 of eggs in which the embryos are fully 

 formed. There is no egg of over a 

 half-inch in longer diameter but what 

 may be saved for the cabinet, (if of 

 sufficient rarity to warrant such de- 

 liberate murder), by the following 

 process : 



The patches above described have 

 the centers cut out with fine scissors 

 or pricked out with a pin, to the size 

 necessary for extracting the embryo. 

 They are then pasted, successively, 

 upon the egg; and then allowed to dry. 

 This done, a section of egg-shell is 

 carefully pricked out; the pin follow- 

 ing along the margin of the opening 

 in the papers. The embryo may then 

 be gently revolved until the head ap- 

 pears. It may then be chloroformed, 

 or deftly and quickly killed with the 

 forceps. It is then withdrawn; the 

 placenta is carefully removed, (loosen- 

 ing it, if necessary, by a stream of 

 water from the blow-i)ipe). The whole 

 egg should then be carefully rinsed, 

 and partially dried. Leave the pasted 

 pieces of paper where they are. Over 

 them now paste a cover, of the same 

 paper, perforating this piece, in the 

 center, with a pin, to insure the thor- 



ough drying of the egg. The egg- 

 marks may now be made upon this 

 paper, — (which, of course, ought not 

 to be very bibulous), — by the use of 

 a fine pen. Use carbon ink, — always 

 and for all such work, use carbon 

 ink. (The writer once saved in this 

 way a rarely beautiful set of five eggs 

 of the Towns'end Solitaire, which 

 could not possibly have been saved 

 in any other way. The resulting spe-' 

 cimens are good, sound cabinet speci: 

 mens, which, unless the paste used 

 should break away from the egg, 

 ought to last indefinitely). 



The value of this process lies in the 

 fact that the strength of an egg lies 

 largely in the arch of the shell, tf 

 this arch be greatly weakened the 

 shell is gone, even though the egg be 

 not weakened by the natural condi- 

 tions that accompany incubation. But 

 the paper reinforcing leaves the brok- 

 en portion of the shell greatly strong- 

 er than it was in the first place; un- 

 less cracks have been made through 

 careless work in the pricking. 



I make no apology for wbat might 

 be called the devilish cold-bloodedness 

 of this destruction of fully develop- 

 ed embryos. It is no wickeder to de- 

 stroy an embryo than it is to blow a 

 fresh egg: and not, of necessity, one 

 whit more inflictive of pain. 



P. B. PEABODY. 



Erroneous Identification. 



In looking over my file of the Oolo- 

 gist in search of references to the 

 Broad-winged Hawk, I find the follow- 

 ing titles which seem to bear evidence 

 of mistaken identity; and as it is im- 

 possible to identify the writers in 

 two instances, and quite uncertain as 

 to the address of the remainder, I take 

 this means of commenting on the 

 matter, and requesting further infor- 

 mation from the contributors. 



('. S. B. Broad-winged Hawk, Black- 



