372 Mr. G. E. Dobson on a 



1 f inch long ; scales are now developed, but seem confined to 

 the anterior and ventral parts of tlie body. The vertebrae are 

 well ossified. 



Ewart and Matthews (3rd Ann. Rep. S. F. B.) found a few 

 herrings, 1^ inch long, amongst the shoals of sprats forming 

 the Forth Whitebait in January. From January we must 

 pass to September, Avhen the herring is found on the sands, 

 about 2| inches long, in the usual company. It has now all 

 the characters of the adult, external and internal, but is 

 probably sexually immature. 



One specimen of the herring 4| inches long was obtained 

 in company with the last, and is probably a year older. 



The career of the young herring has now been traced from 

 the spring of one year to the autumn of the next, and perhaps 

 a year longer, with fair continuity, and its rate of growth 

 noted. (Dr. Meyer was enabled to trace the growth of the 

 herring of the Baltic both in confinement and under natural 

 conditions for five months. He gives 65-70 millim. as the 

 size of a five-months' herring (3rd Ann. Eep. S. F. B. p. 50).) 

 Of its subsequent proceedings the specimens here afford no 

 evidence. It probably goes into deeper water. The record 

 of autumn-hatched herrings is less satisfactory. Eggs came 

 under my notice in the middle and end of August ; but, as 

 pointed out by Prof. M'Intosh and Mr. E. E. Prince [op. cit.)y 

 there must be considerable variability in the autumn 

 spawning-period, some forms being hatched perliaps in July, 

 whilst others, as appears below, are but a few days old on the 

 20th September. Incubation is shorter, as the temperature is 

 higher, than in the spring. Eggs were hatched in this labo- 

 ratory during this September in from seven and a half to 

 eight and a half days. On Sept. 20 we found in midwater 

 postlarval forms varying from y^. to ^| inch, that is, from 

 a few days to a month old. In November 1888 we found 

 them g inch long, and in March 1889, on the bottom, 1^ 

 inch long. Beyond this I have not been able to trace them. 



LII. — Description of a new Species of Water- Shrew from 

 Unalasha Island. By G. E. DOBSON, M.A., F.R.S. 



The type of the very interesting species of Water-Shrew 

 about to be described * was found by me in the excellent 



* This species would have been described, as I had hoped, long ago iu 

 the third part of my ' Monograph of the Insectivora ; ' but the state of 

 my health having prevented the appearance of that part, I am anxious to 

 obviate further delay by immediate publication of the following descrip- 

 tion. 



