Miscellaneous. 3993 
fresh, which the following extract from my MS. Journal, written 
when the animal was caught, will, I hope, afford :— 
**« Ground cinereous, six pairs of white spets between the back of 
the head and root of the tail, symmetrically placed; six to eight. 
lines of red spots on each side, broken and terminating in small 
points towards the belly ; buff-coloured irregular spots on the sides 
among the red lines; belly bright yellow, passing into cinereous to- 
wards the roots of the posterior and anterior extremities; legs and 
tail spotted with red towards their proximal ends, with white spots 
towards their extremities; head irregularly marked with red and 
white spots having a transverse direction. Iris light cinereous, 
tympanum sunken and covered with loose skin.’ 
«This is a homely description, but I give it to you verbatim as it 
is in my Journal, and am sorry that I had not the latter to refer to 
in London when I left you the specimen. 
“Lastly, I notice, p. 250, in the fifth paragraph from the top, 
l. c., that an error has crept into my statement, in the word ‘ An- 
thropophagi,’ which ought to have been ‘ Chelonophagi’ (Turtle- 
eaters). It will not do to make mistakes of this kind; and these 
poor people, degraded as they are, I trust will never come to this.” 
MISCELLANEOUS. 
The Gare-Fowl, or Great Auk (Alca impennis). 
To the Editors of the Annals of Natural History. 
GENTLEMEN,—The September Number of your valuable Journal 
contains a list, communicated by Mr. Robert Champley, of the 
specimens of Alca impennis preserved in the various museums. To 
render this list more complete, I beg to inform you that a specimen 
of this rare bird is also contained in the Imperial Museum of Vienna. 
Requesting the insertion of this note in your pages, 
I remain, respectfully yours, 
A. VON PELZELN, 
Vienna, Oct. 3, 1864. Assistant Keeper in the Imperial 
Zoological Museum. 
[We omitted to remark, on publishing Mr. Champley’s list of 
specimens of this species in our September Number (p. 235), that it 
seems to be very defective. Mr. Alfred Newton, in his communica- 
tion to the Zoological Society, reprinted in our August Number 
(p- 140), states that “sixty-three or sixty-four stuffed skins”? (more 
than double the estimate of Mr. Champley) are known by him to 
exist. Again, in the Appendix to Mr. S. Baring-Gould’s ‘Iceland’ 
(p. 406), which was noticed in our pages (Annals, vol. xii. p. 396), 
Mr. Newton says he can enumerate fifty-nine eggs of this bird, 
adding, ‘‘there must be several besides, of which I have as yet no 
knowledge.’’—Epbs. | 
