170 OUTLINES OF PERIODICAL LITERATURE. 
veral interesting facts connected with the history of this mollusc are record- 
ed. Next in course there comes an elegant and entertaining sketch of Mr. 
Macauley’s, on the flower-gardens of the ancients; this is followed by Dr, 
Weissenborn’s elaborate doctrine on spontaneous generation ; and then Mr. 
Couch advances some observations, with two figures, of Amphioxus Janceola- 
tus, the lancelet, a singular little fish, with which the acquaintance of natu- 
ralists is very limited. After the reviews, there are nine short communica- 
tions ; Dr. Weissenborn’s note on the Bos wrus and Aurochs of the Cauca- 
sian mountains; Mr. Newman’s characters of a new genus of Popillia ; Mr. 
Westwood’s illustrations of Eulophus nemati, the saw-fly, and his notes on 
gynandromorphous hymenopterous insects ; Mr. Clarke’s remarks on the an- 
tennz of insects; Mr. Blyth’s notes on the adult plumage of the female 
Smew, on the Pomarine Skua, and on native woodcocks ; Mr. Luxford’s ob- 
servations on the Chrysosplenium alternifolium ; and Mr. Bartlett’s commu- 
nications on the plumage of the Smew, wherein he assures you, with confi- 
dence, that the adult females possess the black mark round the eye, aud that 
young males obtain this mark some time previously to their assuming the 
adult garb. 
XX.—This, for August, commences with Dr. Brehm’s observations on 
some of the domestic instincts of birds ; and here the doctor affirms that most 
of them not only live in monogamy, but in a union which ends only with the 
death of’ one of the parties, and that the males of almost all the species living 
in monogamy interest themselves in their progeny. Prof. Owen’s paper on 
the camerated structure in the valves of Spondylus varius, the water-clam, is 
illustrated with two figures, and with a chemical analysis of the fluid carefully 
withdrawn from the outer chambers of the shell; and the remarks of Sir E- 
F. Bromhead on zoological classification, are accompanied with an ingenious 
exhibition of quinaries. Another section of Mr. Blyth’s analytic descriptions 
of the Insessores Heterogenes, defines the characters of the Motmots, and com- 
prises a tabular view of the Strepitores, distributed according to their succes- 
sive groups. Mr. Skaife’s ornithology of Blackburn and the north of Lan- 
cashire, embraces a list of sixty-nine birds, which he distributes according to 
the arrangement adopted by Eyton in his published catalogue: in his foot- 
notes, Mr. S. mentions specimens of a white robin, a white willow-wren, a 
black lark, a white lark, and a white sparrow. A continuation of Mr. Mar- 
tin’s monograph of the genus Semnopithecus, comprises his descriptive charac- 
ters of S. nemeus, the douc; S. entellus, the rollewai; S. fascicularis, the 
kra; 8S. cristatus, the chingkau ; 8. femoralis, the white-thighed monkey; S. 
maurus, the moor: S. melalophus; S. flavimanus, the sempais 8S. pyrrhus; 8- 
auratus; S. fulvo-griseus ; 8. latibarbatus, the broad beard; S. johnii, the 
johnny ; S. obscurus, S. nasalis, and §. recurvus. For scientific intelligence, 
you have an interesting account of the eighty-sixth annual sitting of the 
Academy of Sciences at Haarlem ; upwards of thirty distinct prize questions 
on subjects in philosophy, science, and history, are proposed for solution, by 
this institution. Mr. Blyth’s remarks on the plumage of the smew merganser 
and of the crossbill, and Weissenborn’s observations on the effects of the ex- 
cessive and protracted cold of the last winter, occupy the place of short com- 
munications. 
XXI.—September has Mr. Heward’s observations on a collection of ferns 
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