1819.] Memoirs of the Wernerian Society, Vol. II. Part If. 137 
to predict the fate which several opinions, at present sufficiently 
fashionable, and considered as plausible or established, are 
destined to meet with from posterity. Dr. Barclay has devoted 
much of his time to the study of the living principle, and has at 
present a work upon it ready for the press. I have no doubt 
that when it appears, it will do him credit; and that it will 
contain a full and impartial review of all the opinions that have 
been advanced regarding it. 
XIII. On the Genera and Species of Eproboscideous Insects. 
By William Elford: Leach, Esq. 
XIV. On the Arrangement of Cistrideous Insects, By William 
Elford Leach, Esq. 
These papers being entirely technical, do not admit of abridg- 
ment. 
XV, Observations on some Species of the Genus Falco of 
Linneus. By James Wilson, Esq.—This is a learned and 
amusing paper, and well entitled to the attention of ornitholo- 
gists. The genus Falco is one of the most obscure departments 
of natural history; several different names being frequently 
given to the same species, the male and the female being often 
‘described as distinct species, and the old bird in like manner 
distinguished from the young. Mr. Wilson is of opinion that 
the Falco chiysaetos, the golden eagle, is a distinct species 
from the Falco fulvus, or ring-tailed eagle, though several modern 
French ornithologists have confounded them together. His 
reasons seem to be very good for considering them as distinct 
species. The terms Falco apivorus, Falco albidus, and Falco 
variegatus, belong, he informs us, to the same species, the 
Honey buzzard. 
The term gentle, or gentil, is applied by falconers to falcons 
that have been properly tamed and trained. The term haggard 
is apphed to those falcons that have been taken by the lure, and 
not having been sufficiently tamed are apt to fly away after rooks 
and pigeons. - 
Mr. Wilson points out several mistakes into which authors 
have fallen with respect to the Falco gentilis, which is in fact 
nothing else than the common falcon. He gives a description 
of the Falco palumbarius, or goshawk, and of the Falco commu- 
nis, or common falcon, of which he describes no fewer than 
12 varieties. 
XVI. On the Geognosy of the Lothians. By Prof. Jameson. 
—This paper, I conceive, has inadvertently got a wrong title. 
The author has intended it as an introduction to a geological 
account of the Lothians ; and probably when he began to write 
the paper he intended not to stop short at the introduction, but 
to give likewise the geological account to which the title refers. 
But as nothing more has been printed at present but the intro- 
duction, which has little reference to the Lothians, it would 
