88 NATURAL SCIENCE. FEs., 
the Cambridge Philosophical Society on November 14. Mr. H. B. 
Brady had already described specimens of Ovbitolites, showing the 
margin of the disc crowded with young shells, and Mr. Lister was 
able to extend his observations by studying the soft parts of speci- 
mens collected on the Tonga reefs. It now appears that the repro- 
duction of Orbitolites takes place by the formation of spores. Each 
spore contains a nucleus lying in its ‘ primordial chamber.” After 
several rings of chamberlets have been added, a stage is reached at 
which the nucleus appears to be represented by numbers of irregular, 
darkly staining masses scattered through the protoplasm of the 
central part of the disc. In the later stages numbers of oval nuclei 
are found in the protoplasm, often arranged in pairs, and in favourable 
preparations they may be seen to be undergoing division. 
WE are glad to notice that the New Zealand Government is 
actively engaged in preventing the total extinction of the rarer plants 
and animals of the colony. Acting on the advice of Mr. Henry 
Wright, the Government has arranged for the purchase of Little 
Barrier or Hauturu Island, near Auckland, which will be kept asa 
national preserve. This island measures 41 miles in length by 34 
miles in breadth, and rises in the centre to an elevation of 2,000 ft. 
It is generally rugged, but there is comparatively flat land at the 
northern and southern extremities. Even now its flora and fauna is 
particularly rich and varied, and no more suitable area could have 
been secured. 
Bulletin de L’ Herbier Boissiey is the title of a new publication in 
the interests of Systematic Botany, issued under the direction of M. 
Eugéne Autran, Curator of the Boissier Herbarium at Geneva. The 
bulletin is to contain original articles, notes, &c., will appear 
irregularly, and form each year an octavo volume, of about 400 pages, 
with plates. The first part contains a paper, with two plates, on the 
genera Achatocarpus and Gosia, and their place in the natural system, 
by M. Schinz and the editor; also an enumeration of the plants 
contained in Fascicle V. of ‘‘ Plante Postiane,” by the collector him- 
self, including a description of the new species. The specimens were 
gathered for the most part in the mountain chains of Amanus and 
Kurd Dagh, in the north-west corner of Syria. The chain of Amanus 
is well wooded, and the flora consequently differs considerably from 
that of the almost bare mountains of Lebanon and Palestine. The 
whole occupies thirty-two pages. 
Tue severe frost of the early part of last month gave unusual 
opportunities for the study of river-ice on the Thames. In the upper 
part of the tidal waters, where there is no salt, though the rise and 
fall of the tide is still considerable, the ‘‘ ice-foot,’’ or ledge along the 
