On the Egg- of the Ornithorynchus. 151 



of objects of natural history, who has resided many years in that 

 country, and who is known to some naturalists in London. 

 They were brought along with a number of Australian birds to 

 Mr Leadbeater, who has a splendid collection. Mr Holmes 

 was shooting on the banks of the Hawksburgh River, a great 

 way up the country, when he saw an ornithorynchus rise a few 

 feet before him, and escape into the river : he saw the animal 

 distinctly, and knew it well. On examining the spot where it 

 had been sitting, he found a depression about 9 inches diameter 

 in the sand, and the four eggs in question lying in that hollow. 



" The eggs are certainly not those of a bird, but they very 

 closely resemble in form and size those which I have found in 

 many Saurian and Ophidian reptiles, not a tenth part of the size 

 of an ornithorynchus. They have not a thick and a narrow 

 end like most birds' eggs, but have a cylindrical form, suddenly 

 rounded at the extremities, and are of equal thickness at both 

 ends, precisely like those in the oviducts of several reptiles be- 

 fore me. The shells only are preserved, and one of them is 

 broken, which shows its inner surface. They have a uniform 

 dull white colour, and are much more thin and translucent than 

 birds' eggs of the same size. They measure 1§ inch in length, 

 and |ths of an inch in breadth. When we examine the outer 

 surface of the shell with a lens, in place of finding the uniform 

 opacity and compact texture of a bird's egg, we observe that the 

 calcareous matter is so deposited in the membrane, as to present 

 a beautiful reticulated or cellular appearance, not by the for- 

 mation of actual cells, for the surface is quite smooth and uni- 

 form, but merely by the white opaque earthly matter having so 

 dis]X)sed itself in the transparent membrane, as to appear like 

 so many minute cells, with a transparent centre. The inner sur- 

 face of the broken shell does not present this reticulated appear- 

 ance, the white earthy matter being there deposited in separate 

 particles, and giving the whole a minute granular appearance, 

 when viewed througli a lens. 



" This is not the kind of information you expected to receive 

 about the eggs of this remarkable animal, which Lesson con- 

 siders as a bird, Cuvier as a quadruped, and Gneffroy as a rep- 

 tile, and I am sure it is not that kind which I should have 

 been delighted to have been able to communicate to you." 



